Rrrrroll up the Rrrrrim to Rrrrrumble!!!!

You knew it had to happen.  Someone tossed out their Timmy’s cup without checking under the rim.  OOPS – that was the one with the RAV4!  A young girl picks it out of a garbage can and, having difficulty rolling up the rim, asks her friend to do it for her.  The celebration was short-lived.

It seems that the children decided that it would be proper to share the prize.  Their parents initially agreed, but then the father of the girl who found the cup claimed the prize for himself.  The father of the other girl has hired a lawyer.  Now, the unidentified staff member who tossed the cup is also considering legal action.

GET OVER IT, WILL YA??

“Finders keepers; losers weepers.”  Isn’t that what we learned as kids?  Guess what?  The law generally agrees.

If you abandon property, anyone who finds that property can claim ownership in it.  “Abandoning” property generally means that you have dealt with it in a way that you no longer intend to retain any rights to it. 

Abandoning is not the same as losing property, as a person who loses property has not intended to give it up.  Maybe we should say: “Finders keepers, abandoners weepers”, but it just doesn’t roll off the tongue as well.

The teacher who threw the winning cup in the garbage can’t possibly claim that he had any intention to retain it.  By tossing it, he abandoned it, as he intended the cup to go to landfill.  By considering legal action, he is sticking out his greedy rear for a judicial whipping. 

An interesting feature is that the two girls are minors and, by contest regulations, are not permitted to win.  The regulations do allow a minor to transfer the winning cup to a parent or guardian, who will then be the winner. 

As far as I see it, the girl who found the cup gave it to her father.  He is the winner, according to contest rules. 

Timmy’s is, so far, staying out of it.  What else can they do?  They have to be wringing their hands, in that a feel-good giveaway contest with prizes worth a retail value of over $41 million is fuelling litigation.  This is hardly the press that they wanted with the contest.

I don’t think helping your friend roll up a rim is an entitlement to half the prize.  Now, if they had paused before rolling up the rim and discussed the possibility of a prize and that they would share it, then that might be a different story.

It’s amazing what dollars will do to people.  There are many cases dealing with people who have won lotteries and then have a dispute with someone who claims to be entitled to a portion of the prize.

I only hope that common sense prevails and we won’t have a lawsuit over a $35,000 vehicle.  All that will do is create $35,000 in fees for the lawyers involved and then who’s the winner?