Colorado Teens Fined for Giving Cookies to Neighbor

[Matrix Heart]

CNN
DURANGO, Colorado (AP) -- Two teenage girls who surprised their neighbors with homemade cookies late one night were ordered to pay nearly $900 in medical bills for a woman who says she was so startled that she had to go to the hospital.

Judge Doug Walker declined Thursday to award punitive damages, saying he did not believe the girls acted maliciously.  Taylor Ostergaard, 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitti, 18, baked the chocolate chip and sugar cookies one night last July.

They made packages with a half-dozen cookies each and added large red or pink construction-paper hearts that carried the message, "Have a great night."  The notes were signed with their first initials: "Love, The T and L Club."  Then they set off to make their deliveries.

Wanita Renea Young, 49, said she was at her rural home south of Durango around 10:30 p.m. when she said saw "shadowy figures" outside the house banging repeatedly on her door.

She yelled, "Who's there?" but no one answered, and the figures ran away.

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 teenagers' families offered to pay Young's medical bills, but she declined and sued, saying their apologies were not sincere and were not offered in person.

The girls declined comment after the ruling. Taylor's mother said the girl "cried and cried."  "She felt she was being punished for doing something nice," Jill Ostergaard said.

Young said the teenagers showed "very poor judgment"

"The victory wasn't sweet," Young said. "I'm not gloating about it. I just hope the girls learned a lesson."  The teens said they did not answer when the woman called out because they wanted the treats to be a surprise.

Yahoo
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.

Only in America

[Mac 10 †]

serves them right

damn hoes

[Matrix Heart]

I bet she still ate the cookies 

The parents offered to pay the medical bills. Fuck that bitch.

[white Boy]

^ thats what i was wondering, what happneed to the cookies?

[Ðøšïå]

suing girls for giving you free cookies. lol what a dumb bitch. bitch wasted all that time in court to get what she could have gotten from the parents in a few minutes. hope she learned a lesson.

[white Boy]

btw.. is this what america is promoting? like i just made a joke in my last post. but seriously, this is so fuckin ludacris (sp)

[madsamoan]

It sounds to me that she's going to die a lonely old woman.That's sad that in today's soceity people will sue over anything just to make a quick buck."Hey!...you stepped on my foot!...i'm going to sue you!"

[Woodrow]

I hope a cookie truck runs the bitch over.

[madsamoan]

I hope a cookie truck runs the bitch over.

lol

[jobo]

Incredible story, would be funny if not true.

[eS El Duque]

I hope a cookie truck runs the bitch over.

lmao

[Da WCC Hopar!]

i wood have made brownies wit cronik in it

[_That_Cracka_J]

That's why people don't help others out or why people don't do nice things for people.