As she was about to enter the machine, the gun was attracted to the powerful magnet inside it and fired off a single round into and through her right buttock. Luckily, the bullet barely penetrated her skin and the doctor on site described her entry and exit wounds as “very small and superficial.”
There is no way the MRI wasn't damaged. Other hospital go'ers will be footing that bill. She should be garneshed wages for the rest of her life until those repairs are paid.
"Lucky" would be the bullet being lodged in her body, doing no further damage except to her idiot self so she would learn her lesson without impacting others.
Having her money taken for the rest of her life is not a good response. Ofcourse she's a fucking dumbass, but having her life destroyed because of that one moment is not adequate.
The problem of healthcare in the USA is way more severe than a destroyed MRI machine.
FWIW, in the US, seems like you're 'guaranteed' that you'll keep 30 hours worth of minimum wage per week. the minimum wage is abysmal, so ~870 a month, which isn't really enough to survive on in many places. I suspect it would be terribly difficult to pay rent, gas/electric, buy food, pay for public transport and/or gas.
I think this person was dumb. I think they fucked up badly. I think garnishment could make sense if the terms were more reasonable. But I think the current terms could absolutely be detrimental to ones survival.
Title III also protects individuals by limiting the amount of earnings that may be garnished in any workweek or pay period to the lesser of 25 percent of disposable earnings or the amount by which disposable earnings are greater than 30 times the Federal minimum hourly wage prescribed by Section 6(a) (1) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. This limit applies regardless of how many garnishment orders an employer receives. The Federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour.
Source
I agree with you. I feel like there is too often a “throw the book at them!” reaction to every wrong or mistake, maybe especially in the US. Which explains the hyper punitive justice system and the highest prison population in the world.
Well since this is a thread about the article, one would assume you'd be on-topic.
Also you have 0 evidence that her life is destroyed. An MRI isn't very expensive if you're insured, and she's almost certainly insured, because she, ya know, got a fucking MRI.
I read the chain, and it's 2 comments long, and that one person randomly brought up healthcare systems as a total non-sequitor.
The original comment is about her damaging the machine. It stands to reason this person thought she was on the hook for the damages, which is never discussed in the article, nor is damage confirmed.
I agree that part was a non-sequitur. I even thought so myself when I first passed over it.
But the other part of the exchange is not confusing at all and there's zero indication that anyone thought she is actually on the hook for any damages. I'm more-so confused how you could not pick up the meaning even after a re-read.
MRI machines cost between $150,000 to $3,000,000. To me, specifically, that's prohibitively expensive. I assume given the circumstances she's in a significant amount of trouble, with a lethal weapon being grossly mishandled to the point of putting others lives at risk. But, to your credit, that assumption was not clearly attributed in the original post. I think the important thing here is not the disagreements we have in the comments, but the up votes we get along the way.
Your comment started quite the debate here. Everyone needs to slow down and realize there's insurance on the machine and the insurance even covers morons with guns. Might the insurance company go after her? Sure, they'd probably sue her homeowner's insurance, because when in doubt that seems to be what happens. They'd never go after the individual for this, unless it was maybe intentional.
Hospital goers will foot the bill regardless, because that's what we do here in the good old US of A.
The end of your comment is where I was focusing before. Insurance is a for-profit business. Rates most certainly go up for the hospital, which gets transferred to other patients. Reference: worked with hospitals, medical devices, and insurance.
If the bullet exited through the opening in the machine then it may not have struck it at all. Typically a waist holstered gun will have it's barrel pointing down, in the general direction of the carrier's feet, which happens to be towards the opening of the MRI. I think it's entirely plausible the machine wasn't damaged.
Of course that means the bullet would have gone sailing into the opposite wall, which is extremely dangerous. Depending on the wall and caliber it easily could have penetrated the wall and injured/killed someone on the other side.