You Tube Sensation Who Walked Into Mall Fountain While Texting Threatens Frivolous Lawsuit

Somebody please get out the world's smallest violin and start playing "My Heart Bleeds For You" because it time to really feel bad for this lady (NOT). On Monday I found a funny video of a woman walking through a mall paying attention to her texting rather than where she was going. The video (below) must have been grabbed from the malls security camera because you hear them all laughing as the distracted woman walks straight into the mall fountain .

Thankfully the video was taken far enough away that no one could tell who it was, so the all-wet texter remained safe in her anonymity as the video not only became a You Tube sensation but the video appeared on news stations across the country.







Well she was anonymous until today. As is the American tradition the woman, named Cathy Cruz Marrero showed up on the network morning shows, with a lawyer (surprisingly not Gloria Allred) to whine about her embarrassment and threaten a frivolous lawsuit (video below)

Cathy Cruz Marrero, a 49-year-old Berkshire Mall employee, appeared on "Good Morning America" Thursday with her attorney James Polyak and said that someone should have helped instead of making her a national laughing stock.

"I didn't get an apology, what I got was, 'At least nobody knows it was you,'" she told GMA. "But I knew it was me."

Well congratulations Cathy now everyone knows who you are, what you look like, and that you did the little fax pas in the mall that you should know like the back of your hand because you work there.

Polyak told Pennsylvania’s Reading Eagle that an investigation is in the works to see if there will be a suit and to “hold to the appropriate persons accountable.”

"We are troubled by the fact that anyone at the Berkshire Mall responsible for releasing this video would find humor in an employee injured on the premises," Polyak told the Eagle, even though Marrero herself conceded, "It's funny."

Sorry counselor I have seen that video over and over the only thing Cathy hurt was her pride. And that she hurt even more by appearing on TV.  The security contractor for the mall released a statement Thursday saying it has fired a security guard responsible for releasing the video. What else does she want?



Nice added touch, I was texting a friend from Church.  So she wasn't an internationally ridiculed klutz because she was doing "God's work."

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is what is wrong with our legal system, an anonymous woman trying desperately fighting to climb out of her obscurity, get her fifteen minutes of fame and hopefully a little cash  on the side.  Cathy may need the cash for legal fees, after she did the interview above she had to appear in Berks County Court for a status hearing on theft-by-deception and related charges.

According to court documents, Marrero has convictions for retail theft four times and one other theft in New York from 1997 to 1999 and retail theft in York County in 1999.

She also served a year of probation after being convicted of a hit-and-run charge in Berks County in 2009.

According to court records:

The hit-and-run case stemmed from an accident April 23, 2009, in the 900 block of Perry Street.

She ran a stop sign and struck a car, which then hit three parked cars. Two of the damaged cars had to be towed.

Cruz, who was driving with a learner's permit, told police she panicked and drove off.

She was charged with careless driving and related charges and sentenced by Judge Thomas Parisi to one year of probation.

In the most recent theft case, according to Berks court records:

Ileana Rivera of Reading, who worked at the Zales jewelry store in the Fairgrounds Square Mall with Marrero, went to Muhlenberg Township police in October 2009 to report that Marrero had used Rivera's credit cards without Rivera's permission.

Marrero made $4,177 in purchases at Zales and $1,055 in purchases at Target in Spring Township using Rivera's cards for those stores.

The transactions occurred around the time of August 2007.

But $1,055 of those purchases were dismissed from the case in previous hearings.

She also has several theft cases and a hit-and-run charge on her record.

Her appearance Thursday before Judge Peter W. Schmehl was shortly after she and her Reading attorney in the Berkshire Mall case, James M. Polyak, went on ABC's "Good Morning America" to talk about the fall into the fountain.

Her Reading attorney in the theft case, Douglas J. Waltman, said Marrero has applied for intermediate punishment, which can include restitution.

 Kind of makes one wonder why Cathy Cruz Marrero removed the veil of anonymity.