Simon & Luke To File First Ground Turkey Salmonella Lawsuit Against Cargill
Tomorow morning, food safety lawyers at Simon & Luke will file the first salmonella lawsuit stemming from a national outbreak of Salmonella Heidelberg linked to contaminated ground turkey produced by Minneapolis-based Cargill, Inc.
The suit comes after Cargill Value Added Meats Retail, a division of Wichita-based Cargill subsidiary Cargill Meat Solutions Corporation, announced Wednesday that it was instituting a Class I Recall of over 36 million pounds of fresh and frozen ground turkey products. The recall came once health officials identified the ground turkey as the source of a Salmonella Heidelberg outbreak responsible for 77 illnesses, including 1 death, scattered across 26 states.
Included in the recall are both fresh and frozen ground turkey products produced at the company’s Springdale, Arkansas facility from February 20 to August 2, 2011. All recalled products have packages that include the label “Est. P-963” on the labeling.
Salmonella Heidelberg Victim Faces Near-Death Experience
Simon & Luke, with the assistance of Hare, Wynn, Newell & Newton, will file the salmonella lawsuit in the United States District Court in Fayetteville, Arkansas on behalf of a 38-year old Arizona resident David Taber.
Mr. Taber consumed contaminated ground turkey in early June. A few days later, he began to experience severe vomiting, diarrhea and abdominal pain. After multiple trips to his family physician and a local Urgent Care Center – neither of which caused any improvement in his symptoms – he was rushed to the emergency room at Mercy Gilbert Medical Center on June 12, 2011 via ambulance. Upon arrival, doctors immediately admitted him to the hospital with a diagnosis of acute colitis, but could not determine the cause of his illness.
On Day 3 of his hospitalization, the answer became clear – David’s blood culture came back positive for salmonella. Because the deadly bacteria had already spread to his bloodstream, the infection had become septic and life-threatening. He remained at the hospital for several days, and was eventually discharged home on June 18. He is still recovering from his illness.
The Arizona Department of Health Services Laboratory has since confirmed that Mr. Taber’s blood culture tested positive for the outbreak strain of Salmonella Heidelberg, identified by PFGE pattern code JF6X01.0058.
Mr. Taber is one of at least 77 people in 26 states who have contracted an identical DNA strain of Salmonella Heidelberg that matched samples taken from ground turkey produced by Cargill, Inc. The 77 confirmed victims are distributed throughout the United States as follows: Alabama (1), Arizona (2), California (6), Georgia (1), Iowa (1), Illinois (7), Indiana (1), Kentucky (2), Louisiana (1), Massachusetts (1), Michigan (10), Minnesota (1), Missouri (2), Mississippi (1), North Carolina (1), Nebraska (2), Nevada (1), New York (2), Ohio (10), Oklahoma (1), Oregon (1), Pennsylvania (5), South Dakota (3), Tennessee (2), Texas (9), and Wisconsin (3).
Cargill yesterday issued a nationwide recall of 36 million pounds of ground turkey products produced at the plant since February 20.
Cargill – A Repeat Offender
This is not Cargill’s first meat recall. Since 1993 Cargill and its subsidiaries have recalled over 58,000,000 pounds of tainted meat in 10 separate outbreaks, which resulted in at least 323 confirmed illnesses as outlined below:
Simon & Luke Issues Statement
Ron Simon, counsel for Mr. Taber, issued the following statement today: “Cargill’s unsafe manufacturing practices must be stopped. After putting 58 million pounds of tainted meat on our grocery shelves, which has harmed hundreds of consumers, we intend by this and other lawsuits to affect change in the way that Cargill does business. Cargill’s customers deserve better.”
About Ron Simon and Simon & Luke
Simon & Luke’s groundbreaking work on behalf of victims in several recent national food borne illness outbreaks (Peter Pan peanut butter, Castleberry’s chili, Nestle cookie dough, Peanut Corporation of America Peanut products, JBS Swift beef, Daniele salami, Subway sandwiches, Wright County Egg / Hillandale Farms eggs, and Agromod papayas, to name a few) have been featured on NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, FOX and virtually all other major television networks and print media.
The firm has represented over 3000 victims of food-borne outbreaks in the past four years alone, and has collected over $450,000,000 for its clients. The firm regularly publishes articles about food safety and litigation at www.myfoodpoisoninglawyer.com, which are read by viewers in over 140 countries.
The firm is currently accepting Cargill ground turkey salmonella cases and expects to be filing several lawsuits in the near future.
Simon & Luke’s salmonella lawyers and attorneys can help you with your Cargill ground turkey salmonella outbreak, claim, lawsuit, and settlement. If you have questions or information about this outbreak, please call us toll free at 1-888-335-4901 or contact us by email at ron@simonluke.com – we are here to help you.
