Judge certifies settlement in McDonald's French fry suit

Seattle Post Intelligencer ^ | October 31, 2002

[sarcasm]

A judge has certified a $10 million settlement between McDonald's Corp. and a group of vegetarian and Hindu plaintiffs that requires the restaurant chain to publicly apologize for falsely claiming its tallow-flavored French fries had no meat products.

The court approval means that McDonald's will pay the money to the class-action litigants and offer both an apology and its food ingredients on its Web site. The specific distribution of the cash remains undecided by the court.

"The apology was most important to me," said Seattle attorney Harish Bharti, who brought the suit against McDonald's.

[patriciaruth]

I thought it was understood that everything in America is greased with pig fat.

[mn12]

What in the heck are Hindus and vegetarians doing eating at McDonald's, anyway?! I guess just looking for an easy way to get rich, it's a shame they were able to succeed.

[zarf]

This was one of the few valid lawsuits I feel McDonald's deserved to get reemed with.

[Bad~Rodeo]

This was one of the few valid lawsuits I feel McDonald's deserved to get reemed with

...and WHO forced them to eat there....hmmm?

[pariah]

When I worked at McD's back in college, we used to scoop lard from a bucket with our bare hands and dump it in the deep fryer, but I thought they changed to pure vegetable oil a long time ago. Details anyone?

As a former veggie myself, I say it is up to the consumer to check the contents of the food he eats. But if McD falsely claimed to market animal-free french fries, while still using lard, shame on them!

[zarf]

People rely on companies to be truthful in claiming that the contents of their products are accurate ones!!!

When a product says kosher...I"D EXPECT TO GET KOSHER!!! It's no different for a Hindu to rely on Mickey D's claim of "no animal by products in the fries they make!!!

No one made them eat at Mc Donalds, but for McDonalds FALSE claim....they WOULDN'T have!!!!

DUH!!!

[zarf]

McDonalds did change to veggie oil, but they still used some beef tallow to enhance flavoring. In other words they mislead consumers in their claims of no animal by-products in their fries.

[Einigkeit_Recht_Freiheit]

"for falsely claiming its
tallow-flavored French fries had no meat products"



I understand both sides of the issue. First, if you have ever been in the kitchen part of a fast food restaurant - or bothered to peer back to view the teenagers flipping the burgers, you would know that there is greese and oil everywhere and the chances of cross contamination are a virtual certainty. If you don't want to at meat you should not set foot in one of these places

OTOH: If McDonald's really did advertise their product this way well . . . If you are alergic to a substance and I sell you something that I claim does not contain the allergin and then you die - who's fault is it?


(Disclaimer: I am diligently working on changing my screen name - apologies to all German speakers)

[Bad~Rodeo]

It's McDonalds for crying out loud, not a kosher deli. Everyone knows it's not food you want to feed your kids everyday. All i'm saying is that this had better not raise the price of my #2 Value Meal....LOL~

[JoJo Gunn]

The only thing important to that ambulance chaser was a slice of 10 million dollars.

Shakespeare was right....

[MarkT]

Notwithstanding the statement that the apology was ""the most important thing", did this attorney collect any fees? The article fails to mention that.

I was a member of a class action suit (unbeknownst to me until I received a settlement statement) and the lawyers got $3MM for a suit in which they were the plaintiffs and attorneys. Each member of the class is entitled, after filing all the appropriate forms under pain of perjury, to receive $1 to a maximum of $450.

No doubt this was much less about anything other than money.

[SoothingDave]

In other words they mislead consumers in their claims of no animal by-products in their fries.

They did no such thing. They claimed, and it was true, that they were no longer cooking them in animal fat. All true.

They never claimed the fries were vegetarian, nor did they claim that they were a meat-free product. McDonald's just settled this to avoid bad PR.

What with the flavorings and such used in the food industry, unless something is labelled as "free of animal products," one is rather foolish for assuming otherwise. But McDonald's wasn't going to say that.

The idea of cross contamination from the airborne meat grease is enough to discourage any serious person from assuming that fries do not contain any meat.

SD