[mauvaisroux]

Colorado Teens Fined for Giving Cookies to Neighbor

Fri Feb 4,10:49 PM ET

Oddly Enough - Reuters

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.

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Sheesh! They probably would have got in less trouble for breaking the neighbour's windows

[cathyxxx]

wow! I guess I have just about heard it all now!
good grief!

[dentrassi]

That is RIDICULOUS! So much for trying to be a nice neighbor. Aren't we supposed to be ENCOURAGING teens to do nice things like that?!?

[Universityprincess]

That is about the strangest thing I have ever heard.

[lizziness]

That is just sick. And I bet those two girls will not be doing anything nice in the future for anybody.

I know a house that is sure to be egged every halloween from now on.

[BerkshireGrl]

What a load of hooey!

That woman sounds like a complete and utter moron. Nothing more terrifying than cookies and paper hearts...

I hear the US Defense Department is looking into it as their next big tactic. The Colossal Operation!

Cripes!

[lessofsarahtolove]

Originally Posted by BerkshireGrl

I hear the US Defense Department is looking into it as their next big tactic. The Colossal Operation!

Cripes!

That's pretty funny, Sarah!

[mauvaisroux]

How about operation Doughnut Drop?

[mauvaisroux]

But wait, there's more...

Restraining Order Filed in Cookie Case
Strange News - AP

DURANGO, Colo. - A hearing on a restraining order was scheduled Thursday for the family of one of two girls ordered to pay $930 in medical bills to a woman who claimed the delivery of a plate of cookies scared her to the hospital.

Dick Ostergaard, father of Taylor Ostergaard, 18, filed for the restraining order Feb. 4 against Wanita "Ranea" Young's husband, who allegedly made harassing calls to the Ostergaard residence.

Both families said they would try to mediate the matter.

Taylor Ostergaard and Lindsey Jo Zellitti, 18, knocked on the Youngs' door and left a plate of cookies on the porch late one night last July.

Young, 49, said nobody answer when she asked who was there and she could see only shadowy figures that ran away to a car parked outside the gate. The incident happened at her isolated country home where she was with her teen daughter and elderly, ill mother, while her husband was out of town.

Young said she hasn't returned to her part-time job at Wal-Mart and might have to give up the presidency and her seat on the board of the local food bank, a post she's held for 16 years, because of the negative attention she's received.

She's received hundreds of crank calls, along with truckloads of +strange+ packages — some containing cookies or cookie crumbs.

"All this over cookies," she said. "Our home is like a funeral parlor. They've robbed us of our laughter. My spirit, my soul, is damaged."

Despite that, Young said she believes going to court was the right thing.

"I don't know how to change. I don't know how to compromise my principles," she said.

[Wanttolosealot]

She is one sick, twisted and deranged lady! I can understand where it might scare her to go to the door and find no one there, but some one, after she found out what was going on, to go to such lengths. WOW!!!
Virginia