When one uses a Wal-Mart gift card for a purchase of less than the amount of the gift card, the remainder remains on the gift card for use in future purchases. This wasn’t enough for Ashley Peach, who used two $10 gift cards to buy $18.61 worth of stuff at Wal-Mart, and was upset that she wasn’t given $1.39 in cash as change. So she’s suing, demanding punitive damages, and seeking class action status in Madison County. Her lawyers: the Lakin Law Firm. Having found gift cards such a traumatic experience, you’d think Peach would avoid them, but she has two essentially identical suits pending against K-Mart and Fashion Bug for similar misunderstandings. (Steve Gonzalez, “$1.39? Wal-Mart next in line for Peach”, Madison County Record, Nov . 7).
The Peach family are frequent Madison County litigants, with at least five suits going in the system, including a very strange suit against Granite City, where Armettia Peach paid $68,900 (including $20,000 in cash) for a house she had never seen, sued Granite City and some bystanders for allegedly failing to inspect a leaky roof, sold the house for $40,000 to a LLC that then sold it to Granite City’s mayor’s sister-in-law for $57,000–and then received a $104,000 default judgment from Granite City (including $26,000 in legal fees to the Lakin Law Firm), when the town failed to respond to the complaint. Something fishy is going on here, but one doesn’t know what, and whether Granite City officials are victims or participants in something sinister. (Steve Korris, “Plaintiff Peach awarded windfall judgment against Granite City”, Madison County Record, Mar. 31; Steve Korris, “Anatomy of Peach v. Granite City”, Madison County Record, Mar. 31; Steve Korris, “Home repairman gets trapped in legal web”, Madison County Record, Mar. 31).
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