National Organization of Injured Workers

Never Underestimate The Power Of The Media!

December 15, 2008

Satellite Truck Dollar Tree Inc. has agreed to compensate the 11-year-old son of one of its store clerks who was stabbed to death in a Fairfield Dollar Tree Store two years ago, despite the fact that the company's insurance carrier rejected the claim.

The payment, $250,000, is equivalent to the full Workers' Compensation benefit permitted under California law.

Now that was a great story to wake up to last week.

But you have to look deep down in your soul and ask yourself, "Why did this multi-million dollar national company cave in and 'do the right thing' all of a sudden, and out of the blue?

Could it have been the efforts of the family's Workers Compensation attorney, Moira Stagliano, of the Boxer & Gerson law firm who went to bat for her clients, and exposed the morally reprehensive tactics that the employer and their insurer were trying to use to escape their financial responsibility for an incident that was clearly their statutory responsibility under state law?

Could it have the been exposure of this story to print, talk-radio, on-demand, local & network television media and the total outrage by the American blogosphere?

Could it have been those telephone calls to the office of State Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner that KGO radio talk show host John Rothmann asked of his listeners who were likewise outraged at the behavior of Dollar Tree stores in this matter when attorney Stagliano and NOIW volunteer director Sam Gold appeared on his show on the evening of December 3rd to publicize the predicament that the family of Taneka Talley was facing?
(Click here to hear the audio track of the show).

Could it have been the picketing of a number of Dollar Tree stores throughout California by concerned individuals and this organization to deliver a message that unless Dollar Tree became responsible corporate citzens and did the right thing.....

Or was it Dollar Tree's form of damage control over a situation that had very serious public relations consequences to their financial 'bottom line' during the all-important and financially lucrative Christmas season?

It was probably a combination of all of the above, and is just another classic example of what concerned Californians will do and the extent to which they will go when they are outraged at the vicious behavior of corporate America!

America has opened it's heart to this family and in a new and unusual development, even the sister of alleged murder suspect Tommy Thompson has started a drive to set up a trust fund for the son of her brother's victim.

Hopefully, when Dollar Tree finally comes across with the promised payment, it will help secure a better future for her son and help him get the proper education that his mother worked so hard to give him.

This was a very unusual story and the fact that the victim was African-American and that the employer was playing the race card to deny benefits, certainly caught the attention of the media and the hearts of America!

Athough the family would have eventually won their case in the Workers' Compensation court, they won their case in a far more important court, the Court of Public Opinion!

Access to the media is a very powerful and precious resource and should only be used when absolutely necessary, and in order to convey specific messages, unlike some organizations who use it for their daily whines which explains why the mainstream media treats them like the boy that cried "wolf"!