If someone crashes their car into yours, they’re responsible for the damage, right? And if someone accidentally spills red wine on your outfit, they usually offer to pay for the dry cleaning, so it makes sense that if someone spills their drink on your laptop, they should fork out for the damages too, right?
This exact thing happened to Jennifer Purdie, who arranged to meet an internet date at a café. Purdie had just finished using her laptop when her date Mark showed up and spilled hot tea all over the computer as he sat down at the table.
According to Jennifer, after the spillage, Mark told her to take it to the Apple store and let him know the outcome. She did, and they told her it would cost $900 to fix. She texted the cost to Mark, who replied ‘I’ll pay for half. I promise. Just text me your address.’
No prizes for guessing what happened next. Mark went AWOL, stopped responding to texts. After Googling him, Jennifer discovered he was a high-income dentist and was previously involved in four malpractice suits. Jennifer’s brother is a lawyer and her mother works at a big legal firm. She decided to sue Mark to get her money.
Mark was served with papers and appeared for the court date, during which he denied spilling the tea at all, to which the arbitrator responded: ‘You mean to tell me you just offered a complete stranger hundreds of dollars for something you weren’t involved in?’
The text message essentially showed that Mark had admitted to spilling the tea, and had agreed to pay for half the damages. Jennifer got her money. The end.
Picture: Facebook
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.