Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Posts Tagged ‘food safety’

A good burger is hard to find

…complains the LA Times’ David Shaw, who is surprised to find that most restaurants won’t serve him a hamburger cooked rare, or even medium-rare. With a little research, he finds that nothing in California law prohibits serving a burger rare if a customer asks for it, but he’s bound to be disappointed when he discovers that that’s not the cause: the chefs aren’t obeying a bureaucrat’s nanny-state directive, but orders from corporate headquarters to avoid lawsuits from customers who exercise their choice and complain later.

Earlier burger coverage: Sep. 30 and links therein.

Filed under: ,

No good deed goes unpunished

In the same vein as a potluck, AP covers Oscar party excess:

So what happens to all those untouched short ribs, lobsters, truffles and tortes?

Governors Ball leftovers are donated to homeless shelters and other charitable causes around town. But the lawyers got in the way of any such benevolence at the Elton John party, fearing the caterer would be liable for anyone who got sick on the scraps.

(Beth Harris, “Planners get ready for Oscar parties”, Feb. 17) (via Defamer).

Filed under: ,

Rare-burger disclaimers, cont’d

“An exclusive London restaurant stopped asking customers to sign a legal disclaimer if they order rare or medium-rare burgers after the practice came to the attention of the city’s legal community. The restaurant at the five-star Marriott West India Quay in London’s Docklands required diners to complete a form which said it waived the hotel chain’s responsibilities should they suffer food poisoning.” (“Rare burger? Just don’t sue us”, CNN, Sept. 29). We first covered the burger-disclaimer issue more than five years ago: see Aug. 9, 1999.

Filed under: , , ,

Oz: burger pebble depressed her libido

In Australia, Kelly Rae Hennessey is suing McDonald’s claiming she suffered a loss of libido after biting into a cheeseburger that contained a rock, according to a report in the Melbourne Herald Sun. As a result of the contaminated burger, purchased from a drive-through in Adelaide in 2000, “Hennessey says she’s suffered a loss of libido, as well as depression, nightmares, anxiety, nausea, palpitations, diarrhea, shortness of breath and toothache.” (“Woman sues over bad burger”, UPI/InterestAlert, Sept. 26).

Filed under: ,

Icky road to wealth

A Philadelphia jury has awarded $4 million to 17-year-old Anastasia Roberts in her lawsuit against Grand King Buffet, a Chinese restaurant, over an incident in which Roberts chewed on and then spat out a foreign object in a sweet potato ball which proved to be a used bandage. According to her suit “Grand King threw the bandage away, destroying evidence”, and the offending object had blood and pus on it. Roberts, who per the allegations in the suit suffered mightily from post-traumatic stress over the affair, plans to become a nurse. (Dan Gross, “A ‘bloody’ $4M award for teen”, Philadelphia Daily News, Aug. 3; “A fuss over pus”, City Paper, Jan. 22-28).

Filed under: , ,

Autopsy finds mouse died of skull fracture

…undercutting plausibility of claim that it got into the soup by mistake. The “incident caused Cracker Barrel to stop serving vegetable soup at all of its 497 stores nationwide. … [A spokeswoman for the company] said the Pattersons had demanded $500,000 from the company” but now they’ve been arrested instead. (Peter Dujardin, “Tests reveal mouse-in-soup hoax; pair charged”, Newport News (Va.) Daily Press, Jun. 2)(via Legal Reader). See also Jan. 25-27, 2002.

Filed under:

One gateway latte, hold the sugar

“If you’re not alarmed by this situation [the availability of temptingly dessert-like coffee drinks at Starbucks] because you think coffee is no big deal, you must not be aware of the fact that the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse has identified caffeine as a gateway drug. Last year it reported that ‘girls and young women who drink coffee are significantly likelier than girls and young women who do not to be smokers…and drink alcohol.'” (Jacob Sullum, “Bad Taste”, syndicated/Reason Online, May 28; Reason “Hit and Run”, May 24).

Filed under:

Update: German court dismisses licorice-addiction suit

Update to our Apr. 16 story: Margit Kieske, 48, who says she developed heart problems after consuming nearly one pound of licorice per day, has lost her suit against the German confectioner Haribo for not posting a health warning on boxes of the candy. A court in Bonn ruled that the company had complied with the law, which provides that special labeling is needed only if licorice contains more than 0.2 percent of glycyrrhizin, a threshold not reached by the candies in question. (“Licorice Lawsuit Goes Down the Tubes”, Fox News, Apr. 20).

Filed under: ,

“Licorice Addict Sues German Confectioner”

Food-overuse suits not solely an American phenomenon: “German candy manufacturer Haribo has been sued by a woman who blames her addiction to licorice and consequent heart problems on the confectioner, according to a Berlin court announcement. The 48-year-old plaintiff from Berlin is asking for ?6,000 ($7,148) in damages from Haribo because she developed heart problems after consuming 400 grams (14 ounces) of the chewy candy every day for four months.” Medical literature has warned that the active compound in licorice, glycyrrhizin, can cause physiological effects when consumed in extremely large quantities. (Deutsche Welle, Apr. 16). See also Nov. 14, 2001. Update Apr. 20: court dismisses suit, saying product was correctly labeled.

Filed under: ,