Teens bake cookies for neighbors, get sued for $900

[The STE]

DURANGO, Colo. (Reuters) - A Colorado judge ordered two teen-age girls to pay about $900 for the distress a neighbor said they caused by giving her home-made cookies adorned with paper hearts.



The pair were ordered to pay $871.70 plus $39 in court costs after neighbor Wanita Renea Young, 49, filed a lawsuit complaining that the unsolicited cookies, left at her house after the girls knocked on her door, had triggered an anxiety attack that sent her to the hospital the next day.


Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitte, 18, paid the judgment on Thursday after a small claims court ruling by La Plata County Court Judge Doug Walker, a court clerk said on Friday.


The girls baked cookies as a surprise for several of their rural Colorado neighbors on July 31 and dropped off small batches on their porches, accompanied by red or pink paper hearts and the message: "Have a great night."


The Denver Post newspaper reported on Friday that the girls had decided to stay home and bake the cookies rather than go to a dance where there might be cursing and drinking.


It reported that six neighbors wrote letters entered as evidence in the case thanking the girls for the cookies.


But Young said she was frightened because the two had knocked on her door at about 10:30 p.m. and run off after leaving the cookies.


She went to a hospital emergency room the next day, fearing that she had suffered a heart attack, court records said.


The judge awarded Young her medical costs, but did not award punitive damages. He said he did not think the girls had acted maliciously but that 10:30 was fairly late at night for them to be out.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...odd_cookies_dc

She waited until the next day, and she thought she'd had a heart attack?
Wonder if she ate the cookies first

[Vodstok]

gotta love our court system...

Fat? Stupid? Lazy? its nto your fault, sue Someone!

[taylorsmommy]

This is why most people don't do anything nice for anyone anymore. It's really sad.

[The STE]

And if they do the cookie thing again and don't give her any she'd probably sue them again because she didn't get any cookies.


Though it doesn't say she's fat in the article

[Vodstok]

True, but that is generally the case. it also didnt say she was lazy or stupid, that was just implied ;)

[The STE]

more articles:

Cookie girls won't have to pay fine, Station raises money
posted by: Dan Werner (Web producer)
Created: 2/5/2005 11:36 AM MST - Updated: 2/5/2005 12:04 PM MST


RELATED LINKS
Teenagers fined for handing out cookies to rural 'neighbors'



DURANGO, Colo. (AP) - Two teenage girls who got in trouble for surprising their neighbors with homemade cookies will not have to pay nearly $1,000 in medical bills for a woman who says she was so startled that she had to go to the hospital.

Radio station KOA-AM of Denver raised more than $1,900 from listeners Friday to pay the girls' $930.78 fine. The rest of the money will go to a charity dedicated to victims of the Columbine High School massacre.

The story unfolded when teens Taylor Ostergaard, 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitti, decided to bake chocolate chip and sugar cookies and place them outside their neighbors' doors with large red or pink construction-paper hearts that carried the message, "Have a great night" and were signed with their first initials: "Love, The T and L Club."

The trouble began when they approached the home of Wanita Renea Young, 49. Young said she heard someone banging on the door of her rural home late in the evening. She went to the door and saw "shadowy figures" but they refused to answer when she called out to them.

The teens said they did not answer when the woman called out because they wanted the treats to be a surprise.

Young said she was so frightened, she spent the night at her sister's home, then went to the hospital the next morning because she was still shaking and had an upset stomach.

The teens offered to pay Young's medical bills but she insisted on going to small claims court. Judge Doug Walker, after hearing the teens' explanation, awarded medical costs but declined to order punitive damages.

"The victory wasn't sweet," Young said. "I'm not gloating about it. I just hope the girls learned a lesson."

Meanwhile, Richard Ostergaard, father of Taylor, got a restraining order against Young's husband, Herb, in county court, claiming he continues to make harassing telephone calls to the Ostergaard residence.

Wanita Young said, "This has turned into quite a fiasco. It's something that never should have happened and it's just devastating. My phone hasn't stopped ringing. My life has been threatened and I'll probably have to move out of town."

http://www.9news.com/acm_news.aspx?O...7-c589c01ca7bf

Cookie klatch lands girls in court

Two Durango teens thought they'd surprise neighbors with nighttime deliveries of home-baked treats. But one woman was so terrified, she sued and has won.

Taylor Ostergaard, left, and Lindsey Jo Zellitti hold one of the plates of cookies they dropped on neighbors’ porches in July. One recipient sued, saying the gift spurred a trip to the emergency room.

Durango - Two teenage girls decided one summer's evening to skip a dance where there might be cursing and drinking to stay home and bake cookies for their neighbors.

Big mistake.

They were sued, successfully, for an unauthorized cookie drop on one porch.

The July 31 deliveries consisted of half a dozen chocolate-chip and sugar cookies accompanied by big hearts cut out of red or pink construction paper with the message: "Have a great night."

The notes were signed, "Love, The T and L Club," code for Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitti, 18.

Inside one of the nine scattered rural homes south of Durango that got cookies that night, a 49-year-old woman became so terrified by the knocks on her door around 10:30 p.m. that she called the sheriff's department. Deputies determined that no crime had been committed.

But Wanita Renea Young ended up in the hospital emergency room the next day after suffering a severe anxiety attack she thought might be a heart attack.

A Durango judge Thursday awarded Young almost $900 to recoup her medical bills. She received nothing for pain and suffering.

"The victory wasn't sweet," Young said Thursday afternoon. "I'm not gloating about it. I just hope the girls learned a lesson."

Taylor's mother, Jill Ostergaard, said her daughter "cried and cried" after Judge Doug Walker handed down his decision in La Plata County Small Claims Court.

"She felt she was being punished for doing something nice," Jill Ostergaard said.

The judge said that he didn't think the girls acted maliciously but that it was pretty late at night for them to be out. He didn't award any punitive damages.

Taylor and Lindsey declined to comment Thursday, saying only that they didn't want to say anything hurtful.

Young said the girls showed "very poor judgment."

But Taylor had asked her father's permission to bake cookies for the neighbors after livestock-tending chores were done.

"I said, 'Go ahead, as long as I get some cookies,"' Richard Ostergaard said Thursday.

Just as dusk arrived a little after 9 p.m., Taylor and Lindsey began their mad spree. They didn't stop at houses that were dark. But where lights shone, the girls figured people were awake and in need of cookies. A kitchen light was on at Young's home.

Court records contain half a dozen letters from neighbors who said that they enjoyed the unexpected treats.

The cookies were good. It was a nice surprise. They weren't scared.

But Young, home with her own 18-year-old daughter and her elderly mother, said she saw shadowy figures who banged and banged at her door. When she called out, "Who's there?" no one answered. The figures ran off.

She thought perhaps they were burglars or some neighbors she had tangled with in the past, she said.

"We just wanted to surprise them," Taylor said.

Young left her home that night to stay at her sister's, but her symptoms, including shaking and an upset stomach, wouldn't subside. The next morning she went to Mercy Medical Center.

"We feel that knocking on a door and leaving cookies is a gesture of kindness and would not create an anxiety attack in the general public," Taylor's parents wrote to the court.

The girls wrote letters of apology to Young. Taylor's letter, written a few days after the episode, said in part: "I didn't realize this would cause trouble for you. ... I just wanted you to know that someone cared about you and your family."

The families had offered to pay Young's medical bills if she would agree to indemnify the families against future claims.

Young wouldn't sign the agreement. She said the families' apologies rang false and weren't delivered in person. The matter went to court.

Young said she believes that the girls should not have been running from door to door late at night.

"Something bad could have happened to them," she said.

The girls in question:


Yeah, I hope those girls learned their lesson; drugs and sex > guerilla cookies

[Gren the cake]

sucks, but it kinda makes sense

1030 at night is pretty late, esp for fragile old, country bumpkin type ladies

believe it or not, she coulda died. LOL. some people r that strange

[The STE]

she was 49

[TheHitchiker]

What a bitch. She get's free cookies from cute, teenage girls and she decides to sue them for $900? 10:30, who gives a shit. That ain't late. My 80 year old grandparents go to bed later then that. Dumb bitch.

[Gren the cake]

ehh it is KINDA late. old bo dunk white ladies what do u expect? probably fuckin 730 was too late! (yes, 49 is old, hell 40 is old)

i can guarantee though it it were before 10 it woulda been different. generally curfews are around 10 yeh? yeh....

and i think its stupid that they wouldnt show themselfs. i mean fuck iknow id be scared if someone just rang on my shit at 1030 at night and i wasnt expecting someone. and if i asked who it was, and they didnt say anything cuz 'they wanted it to be a surprise'

am i saying they deserved it? no. am i saying they were completely undeserving? no. good intentions are sometimes just that.. good intentions

they coulda used better judgment... thats all.