 to honest reporting? The truth being covered?
CNN/360 bullied Wal-Mart into capitulating. Nevermind that the Shank family lost their case in court, lost their appeal as well...and why did they lose? Because they had no case–but in this POLITICALLY CORRECT world in which we presently live in; it is all about ENTITLEMENT.
Yes, it is a horrible situation Mrs. Shank is in but she is not entitled to monetary compensation from her employer because of an accident and injuries she sustained elsewhere.
I find this story absolutely shameful because of the way Wal-Mart was portrayed as the 'bad guys' and the Shank family was portrayed as the; pitiful injured party –entitled to money from a business that was not, if I understand correctly,responsible in any way with the accident that Mrs. Shank experienced in the first place!
What am I missing here? What is the matter with you AC and your minions? What don't you logically, honestly, truly not understand about this case/story?
This sort of reporting from AC360 is what I now expect–it is why I now tune into AC360 only to assuage my curiosity over what designer suit and color of tie AC will be wearing –"Keeping Them Honest", what's that got to do with anything?
This was just shameful reporting.
If Walmart wants to do the right thing they should start a trust fund for her for FIVE million dollars then I might shop there again!!!!!!!!
I've been boycotting Wal-Mart for the past 6 years for reasons not mentioned in the article. 
Its pretty bad that it takes Bad Publicity and people to boycott Wal-Mart for them to do the right thing. They should have never went after this family in the first place, this family has suffered enough as it is. My thoughts and prayers are with this family. It just goes to show u that Company's don't care about there Employees they only care about the money they profit. I really hope Wal-Mart pays dearly for this because they deserve it. I think people should still boycott Wal-Mart and show them they done wrong.
Elation is the word that comes to mind regarding the Shanks and Walmart. Last week my daughter was on spring break from grad school in Illinois, visiting me in Atlanta. We heard the CNN report about Walmart recouping her health care costs. Outrageous! We both got on our laptops and wrote letters to corporate. A day or so later, we got form emails saying basically, "This is our policy and tuff noogies." Gratifying that they reconsidered did the right thing!!!
Before you go throwing the attorney under the bus you need to understand how the system REALLY works. To say the "trucking company should just pay b/c they were clearly at fault" is like saying if the Easter Bunny would just bring us all six figure jobs and a big sack of goodies, all of the world's problem's would be solved. It is not reality.
No trucking company (or any company for that matter) is just going to voluntarily hand over a million bucks. $800 for a fender bender, sure sometimes. A claim that could be worth millions of dollars? Never a chance! Almost always is it not the trucking company who will pay a claim but their insurance carrier. Insurance business model is simply take in premiums and pay out as little as possible. This is not achieved by casually paying a million dollar claim b/c “it is clear” they should. No case is clear. No matter how egregious fault it, they will find some engineer to say Ms. Shank was somehow at fault. Then Ms. Shank’s attorney must hire an engineer at $350/hr. Then the insurance company will find a neurosurgeon to say her injuries are not severe and not permanent. So then Ms. Shank’s attorney must hire a neurosurgeon at $900/hr to say otherwise. This just goes on and on until finally the trucking/insurance company realizes you can fight them toe to toe.
If you do not hire an attorney (or even one who can bankroll a case like this) the trucking company or insurance company will NEVER settle and if you do not have a team of expensive experts the defense can move to have your case thrown out.
RE: the $600k. No lawyer is ever going to charge a 60%. The Shanks could easily find other lawyers to take the case on a smaller fee. So where is the rest of the money? Well, for one, tens of thousands (We had a trucking last month case that we had $140k in litigation/expert costs) went out in expert and litigation costs (remember each side pays their own litigation costs). Next just b/c Wal Mart Health insurance paid $470k for medical bills does NOT mean that was all of the bills. Often they will only pay 80%. That means the Shank’s bill was closer to $600-700k.
Guess what? The HOSPITAL gets to sue for the remainder of that money owed to them. Add up all these costs which ALL have to come out of the settlement and the numbers now make sense.
Why did lawyer only settle for $1million? Federal Motor Carrier act requires that 18 wheelers ONLY have to carry $1million in coverage. If the trucking company is in bankruptcy, has its assets under a mortgage, etc, there is NO OTHER MONEY TO GET. Thank your republican Congress for allowing trucking companies, which can kill and maim numerous people in one crash, to have this minimal amount of coverage.
And while you are at it, thank your republican Congress for strengthening ERISA (type of health insurance plan) to where they can legally do what they did to the Shanks.
Oh, and still while you are at it, also thank them so when YOUR ERISA health plan denies paying for a life saving treatment improperly, you can ONLY sue them for the costs of that treatment. (i.e., after they unreasonably refused to pay for your life saving treatment, you sue them for the improper denial, then you die, then win your family wins in court, they get to say, “oh, well, here is the little bit of money for that treatment we SHOULD have paid for three years ago.) Which of course will do your family a lot of good b/c you will long be dead by the time it takes three years to get through the court system.
It is never as simple as it appears.
This story bothers me. I am glad Wal*Mart did a nice thing in the end. But I felt that portraying the big store as an evil Goliath was wrong.
The only "winner" in this piece was the Shank's attorney. He took more than half of the awarded money and didn't work with the Shanks when it looked like they'd lost all their legal battles.
Here's a similar, but not so heartbreaking example: I have a small condominium on a second floor. Due to a plumbing problem that was the fault of the builder, the downstairs unit had some ceiling damage. The owner of that unit said he was going to sue me, because his lawyer said it would be insurance company that he'd get the money from, so it wouldn't affect me.
That's just not true. Every single lawsuit and lawsuit award affects us all - why do you think insurance costs are so high? It's because of all of the lawyers who "win" settlements for their clients, and then take 50% or more of the award. When companies have to add in settlements and legal fees to their costs of providing us with insurance, no wonder they don't offer proper healthcare.
Randi–This should make you feel so proud. You have done a great thing for this family. Thanks for getting the word out about this case so that we could all put pressure on Wal-Mart to do the right thing. Had it not been for your report on 360, I would not have known about this.
it is good to know that journalism done right can still make a difference. i was moved by the story about debbie when it aired, and i am glad to see so many others were as well. it seems in this case justice was served in the proper way, thanks to the interest of a good journalistic team. good job 360!!
First of all, walmart is the most un-american thing in america. How cold of them to treat this woman like this. I don't shop there to begin with, but this certainly sealed the deal for me. I will never shop there. They have put too many americans with decent jobs out of work... and provided too many low paying jobs.
They did this to counter the negative press. There is no other reason that they "changed their minds".
Notwithstanding that this was a sad story, these folks got really lucky. It is a perfect example of the ignorance Americans claim when referring to the signing of contracts and legal documents.
As a person in the legal field with more experience than I want to admit with such ignorance (because it would be acknowledging that the country I live in is more ignorant than educated), I have to say that a story like this should benefit those who saw it and are ignorant of the fact that they, too, signed such an agreement with their country.
 Understand, by the way, that such agreements work hand in hand with the regulation of health insurance costs. If every person in the country who had such an accident collected from the insurance company and then sued for those costs, (which by the way they did not pay because a second party insurance company covered them), health insurance premiums, health care and litigation costs related