Posted on: Wednesday, January 26, 2005
McDonald's must face obesity suit by teenagers, court rules
By Tom Becker and David Glovin
Bloomberg News Service
NEW YORK — McDonald's Corp., the world's largest fast-food chain, must defend a suit by New York teenagers who claim the company hid the health risks of Chicken McNuggets and other foods and made them obese, an appeals court ruled.
The court overruled U.S. District Judge Robert Sweet's decision to dismiss the suit, which seeks billions of dollars in damages. He ruled it failed to allege enough facts connecting McDonald's food and their obesity. The New York-based court said the teens and their lawyers should be allowed to collect evidence for the case.
The ruling clears the way for the teenagers, Ashley Pelman and Jazlen Bradley, to demand documents from McDonald's and gives them more leverage in any settlement talks. The suit is the first complaint accusing a fast-food chain of hiding health risks of their food to be considered by a judge. The decision "is going to scare the hell out of McDonald's and every other fast-food company," said John Banzhaf, a consultant on the suit who helped initiate litigation against tobacco companies 30 years ago.
The teenagers said they ate at McDonald's restaurants three to five times a week over a 15-year period. The suit claimed the company hid the health risks of Big Macs, Chicken McNuggets and other foods high in fat and cholesterol in 1987 advertisements.
McDonald's, based in Oak Brook, Ill., said there was no evidence the teenage plaintiffs, one of whom was born in 1988, saw the ads. The company also defended the accuracy of its ads.
"As we have consistently said, common sense tells you this particular case makes no sense," McDonald's spokesman Walt Riker said. "We are confident this frivolous suit will once again be dismissed. The key issue remains personal responsibility, and making informed choices."
Samuel Hirsch, a lawyer representing the teenagers, didn't return a call seeking comment.
Sweet dismissed the suit because the teenagers failed to say whether there was a connection between their obesity and their consumption of McDonald's food. The appeals court said that's an issue to be addressed later in the course of the lawsuit.
"I hate to see this lawsuit coming, just because it's more bad press for the whole industry," said Peter Goldman, who helps manage about $1 billion at Chicago Asset Management, including McDonald's shares. "McDonald's is not holding a gun to anyone's head. I think they are doing the right thing. They are taking the menu the right way."
McDonald's is trying to switch to lower-fat fry oil and phased out super-size fries and soft drinks. McDonald's shares rose 20 cents to $31.94 in New York Stock Exchange trading.
The ruling came the same day that the documentary "Super Size Me," in which director Morgan Spurlock eats only at McDonald's for 30 days, was nominated for an Academy Award. "For me it's a tremendous decision," Spurlock said in an interview. "I think we've reached a point where people and the judicial system are starting to realize that there is a separation between personal and corporate responsibility, that corporations do have a line they have to uphold when it comes down to what they present to people."
Other lawsuits against fast-food restaurants have settled, said Banzhaf, a George Washington University professor who, with his students, entered into a $12 million agreement resolving a suit against McDonald's over the way it cooked its french fries.
However, Richard Berman of the Center for Consumer Freedom, said in a statement: "It's a shame that the courts will now have to spend more time and money teaching a few money-hungry lawyers what the rest of us have known since kindergarten — individuals are responsible for their own food choices."
The center is a nonprofit coalition of food companies and consumers.
