Edward Espinosa of Fresno, California, burned himself when mashed potatoes fell in his lap as he was playing in a school lunchroom, an injury that required plastic surgery after the burn became infected. The boy's father, William Espinosa, filed a lawsuit against the Fresno Unified School District, claiming that the food the cafeteria served should not have been so hot and that the attendant should have restrained the boy, then in the first grade.

An appellate court has reinstated the case, which was dismissed in a lower court. Robert Rosati, the attorney representing the school district, maintains that the case should be dismissed again. He says that before the incident, the attendant told the boy several times to sit down and eat his lunch. "What was she supposed to do?" he asks. "Do you tie the kid up and spoon-feed him?"

As for the temperature of the food, the state of California requires its schools' hot food to be at least 140 degrees, and the Food and Drug Administration requires that food cooked off the premises and then reheated, as is done in the Fresno schools, be 165 degrees. Accordingly, Rosati feels that there is little the school could have done differently. "Their argument is it is a breach of duty to serve food that is too hot," he says. "The bottom line is ... hot food is supposed to be hot."

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