Debbie Shank used to stock shelves at night for Wal-Mart so she could spend time in the afternoons with her three sons. Now she lives in a nursing home, requires around-the-clock medical care and owes Wal-Mart almost $500,000.
Last November, I wrote about this 52 year-old Missouri woman who worked for Wal-Mart when she was left "brain damaged, disabled and penniless" from a car accident seven years ago. Much to Wal-Mart's dismay, the story isn't going anywhere. This week, it was the lead feature and most-emailed story on CNN.com, and was featured on CNN's Headline News and Anderson Cooper 360. Wednesday, Wal-Mart was named "Worst Person in the World" on Countdown with Keith Olbermann.
Now Wal-Mart is forced to decide if the relatively small amount of money they'll collect from this suffering family is worth the damage to its reputation from the growing national outrage against what Wal-Mart is doing to Debbie Shank.
First, a little background on the story:
After the accident, Debbie won a $417,000 settlement (after legal fees) from the trucking company at fault, which the family set aside in a trust for her future medical expenses. Wal-Mart subsequently used a subrogation clause in Debbie's health insurance policy contract to sue the family for $470,000 to reimburse the company for every cent it had paid for Debbie's medical bills - plus interest and legal fees.
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court crushed the family's last hope when it refused to hear Debbie Shank's case, and required her to pay Wal-Mart $470,000 - more than the amount that remains in her trust. Now her family doesn't know how they'll pay Debbie's nursing home bills.
This family has already sacrificed enough. In fact, around the same time the U.S. District Court sided with Wal-Mart over the Shank family in fall 2006, Debbie's 18-year-old son, Jeremy, was killed while serving in Iraq. The Shanks are an honest, hard-working family living most people's worst nightmare - and Wal-Mart is determined to make it worse.
Debbie's husband, Jim, recently told the Morning News for Northwest Arkansas:
"She's 52 and she's going to live a life in a nursing home. I just got a call today from the head nurse, and (Debbie) hasn't eaten in a couple days and she's talking about wanting to die," Shank said. "It makes the visits hard."
... "Be a human being; don't be a corporation," Shank said, "for the sake of one lady who is going to be miserable for the rest of her life. Take your victory. Let us pay some bills and get some quality of life."
Wal-Mart representatives repeatedly assert that it is necessary to take this money from the Shank family to ensure its health care plan can pay its future claims for associates. But, as Jeffrey Toobin pointed out on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360, Wal-Mart does NOT have to sue this family. The reality is that Wal-Mart's health insurance plan is funded by Wal-Mart - the largest company in the world with $11 billion in profits last year, and run by the Walton family - the wealthiest family in the United States.
This company already has a reputation for treating its employees poorly, but for Wal-Mart to take Debbie Shank's money shows that Wal-Mart and the Walton family are truly heartless.
In December, Wal-Mart Watch conducted an online fundraiser for the Shank family and appealed to the Wal-Mart Foundation, the Wal-Mart Employee Fund and the Walton foundation to match our donation. But, Wal-Mart didn't care enough to even respond.
We recently launched an online petition to ask Wal-Mart to let the Shanks keep their money because we're not the only ones who think that Wal-Mart employees or shareholders would probably be willing to let this one go. Wal-Mart earns $470,000 in revenue every 38 seconds and Lee Scott takes home more than $470,000 every week.
For the millions of dollars that Wal-Mart spends to improve its image, it can't hide from the truth. Wal-Mart can still do the right thing and let the Shank family keep their money so they can take care of Debbie. Or, it can continue to be live up to its poor reputation, recently dubbed "the worst person in the world."
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Walmart did NOT go after the trucking company or their Insurance company to retrieve their expenses, even though it was pretty clearly the fault was that of that driver's. They did not go after them because THOSE companies are well funded with BIG legal teams and money to burn.
No, Walmart waited until the family, who footed the huge legal bill to sue for damages to help cover this womans LIFETIME of care and pain and suffering, won their case, and then rained Legal TERROR down upon that family, a family with no resources (save what they had after their own legal expenses) and who are in the midst of unimaginab
So, they made this family cover THEIR legal expenses in recouping their costs from the other insurer, and in effect used THIS FAMILY, the lowly employee, to sue the third party instead of taking that responsibi
Anybody who thinks that is fair must be working for Walmart corporate.
ANY BODY WHO HAS HEALTH INSURANCE CAN BE SUED BY THE INSURANCE COMPANY TO GET MONEY FROM OTHER INSURANCE CLAIMS, LIKE AUTO, OR FROM RELATED LAWSUITS. IT HAPPENED TO A FRIEND OF MINE AND IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU!!!! This is not confined to WALMART only.
I wonder, when Hillary forces everyone to buy from these crooks, will this law still be enforced? I bet it will, and she probably was aware of this while she was on the board at walmart.
Debbie Shank signed on to this plan, and like most of us would, did not care much about the payback clause because it is something that you worry about if you have to. You certaintly would not fore go health insurance because of it. Luckily, the overwhelmi
The Wal-Mart funded health insurance plan is laid out so that if you are compensate
Wal-Mart is only doing what is their right to do. If they don't do it in Debbie's case, then they won't be able to do it to any of its employees who have much lesser accidents. That would cause higher premiums to all involved. Remember that in order true ensure true fairness, Wal-Mart has to treat everyone the same way. Not on a case by case basis.
Second, This is not particular to WALMART, but rather ANY INSURANCE COMPANY, INCLUDING YOURS can do this, and in fact they did attempt to do it to a friend of mine, but the families laywer was able to fight them off. This is part of state law, written by SCUMBAG legislator
for instance, lets say you are in a car accident, and you are badly hurt, and health pays and then your auto pays for other aspects of your recovery (ie to cover lost wages, other expenses), as a normal part of your auto policy. The Health insurer is alowed BY LAW to try to sue you to get that ALL OF THEIR PAYMENTS TO YOU BACK, ie whatever amout the other insurer pays you for any reason.
This is fundamenta
The state or federal law that allows this MUST be overturned
I still think Wal-mart should do the right thing. But, I also think that it is unfortunat
This is what Walmart is doing. they are trying to get away with paying NOTHING towards the health insurance that this woman SLAVED away to pay every month as part of her MEAGER compensati
REALLY, THOUGH, ANY insurance company can choose to do this, even yours. The politician
They tried to export this approach to Mexico and it failed lacking many of the culturalis
For us will should do everything in our power to boycott anything from them or Sams. Not simply because of this troubling case but the many that have gone unreported
Having said that, Wal-Mart operates a self-insur
So Wal-Mart sucks, but they did what the plan requires. But this is a horrible situation for this family.
They are still evil.
The suggestion that WalMart should give them money just because this lady used to work there is a little irrational
Better still: raise minimum wage to $15/hour; tax the WalMart owners at 90% of everything they earn over $1.0 million, and use that money to provide publicly-f
That is so Craven that it is beyond belief.
The same thing happened to a friend of mine, (not walmart, just a health insurance company).
That person sucessfull
I wonder, when Hillary forces everyone to buy health insurance form these crooks, it that little gem of a law will still be in place. What do you want to bet it will?
(Keeping in mind it IS the CEO, so has a particular point of view.)
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However, despite what WalMart says, they were under no legal requiremen
WalMart is self-insur
Were the controllin
When you set up a system it works that works within a set of laws and guidelines