Food Liability Law Blog: Personal Injury Law

Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Personal Injury Law Blogs

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Personal Injury Law

Food Liability Law Blog

Discussion of emerging legal threats to the food industry.
By Kenneth Odza

Post Frequency: 2.2/day

Last Entry: August 19, 2016 at 16:09:48

Trading Places, the 2010 Edition: OJ Way Up, Bellies Down and Out?

Posted on December 31, 2010
We here at the Food Liability Law Blog like to end the year on a positive, or at least humorous, note, so two items in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal caught our eye. Everyone, of course, has been barraged with Christmas movies the last month, but I am a big fan of New Year's movies...

Green Chemistry Regulations Delayed

Posted on December 28, 2010
Apparently, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, due to opposition from both the industry and environmental and health groups defending green-chemistry regulations, the state of California failed to meet a deadline to approve the new regulations...

The FDA's Own 30,000 Foot Take on the Food Safety Bill

Posted on December 22, 2010
For what it's worth, this is the link to the FDA's own interpretation of what the new food safety bill means.

The Sally Jackson Cheese Recall: the Last Purely Voluntary Recall?

Posted on December 21, 2010
There are few places in the United States that have less in common than Oroville, Washington and Washington, D.C. Tucked against the Canadian border in the peaceful and beautiful Okanagan Valley, Oroville is easier to reach from Kelowna, B.C. than from Seattle...

To access this complete feed in the blog feed reader login or register for free.

Food Safety Modernization Act Will Become Law and Effective Immediately

Posted on December 21, 2010
Today the House passed and sent to the President for his signature a bill to overhaul the current regulations on food safety, which were established over 70 years ago. Among other things, the bill will impose new record-keeping requirements on companies, require most FDA-regulating entities to maintain food safety plans, require the FDA to develop a traceability pilot project, and give the FDA broad authority to mandate recalls, regulate food and ingredients that are imported, conduct regular inspections of facilities that produce food and impose new fees on the industry...

Food Safety Modernization Act Will Become Law and Some Provisions Effective Immediately

Posted on December 21, 2010
This entry has been corrected to reflect that some of the provisions in the Food Safety Modernization Act, most significantly the preventative controls section, will be phased in over time. Today the House passed and sent to the President for his signature a bill to overhaul the current regulations on food safety, which were established over 70 years ago...

Food Safety Legislation Back from the Dead

Posted on December 20, 2010
On Friday, S. 510, the food safety bill, was declared dead. Last nite (Sunday), the Associated Press reported the bill may finally pass in the final hours of the 111th Congress. The New York Times report can be linked here. The text of what I understand will be headed to a final vote in the House on Tuesday and signed into law by the President can be linked here...

Dannon Forced to Open Wallet and Change Advertising (Again)

Posted on December 17, 2010
Note: The following is posted by David Pacheco from the Essential Nutrition Law Blog. The multinational food company Dannon agreed to a 45 million dollar class action settlement earlier this year based on consumer complaints about advertising claims regarding the health benefits of its probiotic line of dairy products...

What Happens if Food Safety Bill Becomes Law (or Doesn't)?

Posted on December 15, 2010
We're nearly down to the wire on whether the 111th Congress will send S.510, the food safety bill, to the President for signature into law. I'm told it could happen by the weekend. No matter what happens in Congress, food law is changing and changing faster than it ever has...

Unintended Consequences of FDA Mandatory Recall Authority?

Posted on December 10, 2010
For years, a debate has raged on the merits of vesting the FDA with mandatory recall powers. Mandatory recall is part of the food safety legislation that may or may not pass in this Congress, so it's worth discussing. At present, the FDA lacks any power to order a recall...

Senate Passes Food Safety Legislation, Will It Become Law?

Posted on November 30, 2010
Today, the United States Senate passed the food safety bill, S. 510. If this were to become law (and according to the New York Times , this is a big if), the legislation would impose the most sweeping changes to food regulation in decades. Among many other things, the bill would allow the FDA to order mandatory recalls, impose new record keeping requirements on businesses and establish stricter import standards...

"Sweet" and "Natural": Can One Word Have Meaning And One Not?

Posted on November 23, 2010
Two news items are our topic today: Ben & Jerry's removed the term "all natural" from its ice cream and was immediately sued by someone; and some people are labelling ordinary onions as "sweet" and charging a premium for them...

FDA Issues Warning Letters to Manufacturers of Caffeinated Alcoholic Beverages

Posted on November 18, 2010
The following is authored by guest blogger Jake Storms, from the Alcoholic Beverages Law Blog. In an update to an earlier blog post, the FDA issued warning letters today to four manufacturers of caffeinated alcoholic beverages. The FDA stated in the letters that caffeine added to malt alcoholic beverages was an 'unsafe food additive ' and thus, such products are in violation of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act ('FFDCA')...

Arm Me with Knowledge: A Response to Ken Odza

Posted on November 17, 2010
Ken posted an entry with the title: 'Can Business Lawyers Afford to Practice ‘Defensively.'' I've been a business lawyer for almost 30 years, so I think I have at least some perspective on that issue and I thought I'd contribute to the discussion with some historical observations...

FDA Issues Warning on Alcoholic Energy Drinks; States Move to Ban "Blackout in a Can"

Posted on November 17, 2010
Note: The following is authored by guest blogger Jake Storms, from the Alcoholic Beverages Law Blog. Amidst rising incidences of hospitalizations in college and teenage drinkers linked to consumption of alcoholic energy drinks, the Washington State Liquor Control Board banned their sale effective tomorrow, November 18, 2010...

More on FOP Labeling

Posted on November 17, 2010
Here's a link to an article that appeared recently in Inside Washington's FDA Week concerning the issue of front-of-package labeling (FOP). The article takes aim at the debate about state vs. federal regulation of FOP labeling. Here's a link to a recent post in this blog on the FOP issue.

Food Safety Tools and Defenses for Cheesemakers

Posted on November 15, 2010
Cheesemakers have endured a string of bad publicity recently over food safety. Cheesemakers, especially raw milk cheesemakers, are in the cross hairs of the FDA, the media, retailers and plaintiffs' lawyers such as Bill Marler. I was interviewed last week on FDA seizure issues by the Pacific Northwest Cheese Project...

Can Business Lawyers Afford to Practice "Defensively"?

Posted on November 02, 2010
I appreciate why lawyers practice defensively. We are risk adverse as a profession. But is this what our clients want from us? After all, our clients are usually in a risk-taking position when they seek our advice in the first place. In today's business climate, competition in almost ever sector is fierce to say the least...

Multiple Occurrences in a Single E.Coli Outbreak: Double-Edged Sword for Insureds?

Posted on November 01, 2010
Marler Clark clients and the owners of the restaurant that sold MarlerClark's clients food they claim was contaminated with E.coli O111 joined forces against the restaurant's insurer. In the end, the peronsal injury plaintiffs and the restaurant insured convinced the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma on a Rule 56 summary judgment motion that a single E...

Listeria Recall Toolkit

Posted on October 28, 2010
The FDA recently took the relatively unusual step of obtaining a court-issued warrant to seize all cheese products at Estrella Family Creamery, a small, family-owned artisan cheese maker in Washington State. According to the United States Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington, "the FDA asked Estrella to recall all cheese products...

TerraChoice Issues Timely 2010 Greenwashing Report

Posted on October 27, 2010
Just a few weeks after the Federal Trade Commission unveiled its proposed new Green Guides for public comment, environmental consulting firm TerraChoice chimes in with its 2010 report, 'Sins of Greenwashing – Home and Family Edition.' In our increasingly green economy, TerraChoice makes a couple unsurprising, if not disappointing, findings...

Front of Package Labeling Claims Survive Motion to Dismiss

Posted on October 25, 2010
A recent decision held that Front of Package ('FOP') labeling claims may not (yet) be subject to federal preemption. The decision in a putative class action, Chacanaca v. The Quaker Oats Company, involves what has become a common fact pattern: The FDA says an issue is complex and subject to industry guidance and possibly rule-making (for example, use of the terms 'natural,' 'wholesome,' and 'smart choices'), while a court says the issue may not be complex and may be perfectly within the expertise of the judiciary and jury system...

FTC Green Guides, Sustainability & Third Party Certification

Posted on October 11, 2010
Our previous blog entry discusses last week's release of the Federal Trade Commission's ("FTC") revised, proposed "Green Guides" generally, discussing how the FTC is focused on "deception" and is not taking a radical departure from the 1998 version (the last version) of the Green Guides...

New FTC "Green Guides" Are Out of the Gate

Posted on October 07, 2010
Following several years of development, and much anticipation in recent months, the Federal Trade Commission has finally released 'Proposed, Revised Green Guides.' The new Green Guides will be open for public comment until December 10, 2010...

Juicy Jurisprudence: FTC and POM Wonderful File Suits

Posted on October 04, 2010
Over the last several weeks, the Federal Trade Commission (the 'FTC') and POM Wonderful LLC ('POM'), the makers of POM Wonderful 100% Pomegranate Juice and POMx supplements, have been engaged in a battle over the scope of the FTC's authority to regulate advertisements and the propriety of claims POM has made in marketing its products...

The OchocincO's Misprint: This Wouldn't Happen with Flutie Flakes

Posted on October 01, 2010
There is a niche market out there for celebrity-endorsed food products that benefit charities. PLB Sports out of Pittsburgh appears to be a market leader in this niche, labeling products ranging from beef jerky to salsa to mustard with images and slogans relating to both individual sports figures and teams...

Litigation Strategies for Responding to Significant Consumer Threats

Posted on September 29, 2010
I've been invited to speak this Friday at the University of Oregon School of Law's symposium entitled "Cultivating Our Future: New Landscapes in Food and Agricultural Law and Policy" as a part of the "Food for Thought - Strategies for Advocacy" panel...

Aurora Dairy Organic Milk Case: Eighth Circuit Preempts Some Claims And Remands Others

Posted on September 24, 2010
As we reported some time ago, a class action suit was pending in the Eastern District of Missouri against Aurora Dairy, its organic certifier and certain retailers for violation of state consumer protection laws. The district court had dismissed the case on the grounds that all claims were preempted by the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990 (OFPA), and the plaintiffs appealed to the court of appeals for the Eighth Circuit...

Peeled, Inc. Seeks Injunction, Damages in Trademark Infringement Suit Against Peeled Fruit LLC

Posted on September 17, 2010
Originally posted on the Essential Nutrition Law Blog by Jonathan Stagg Peeled, Inc. ('Peeled') www.peeledsnacks.com, a company specializing in healthy, natural snack foods including dried fruits and dry roasted nuts, recently filed a trademark infringement suit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York against Peeled Fruit LLC ('Peeled Fruit') www...

What's in a Name? - Trade Organizations Push for HFCS Flexibility

Posted on September 16, 2010
The Corn Refiners Association (the 'CRA'), a trade organization representing the US corn refining industry, recently petitioned the Food and Drug Administration (the 'FDA') to allow the term 'corn sugar' as an alternative label declaration for high fructose corn syrup ('HFCS')...

Previous | Next

Related Law Bulletins

Insurance Department Issues Second Annual Ohio Medical Liability Closed Claim Report
COLUMBUS — The Ohio Department of Insurance has issued its secon...

While accident victim recovers $2 million from franchisor on vicarious liability claim
In contrast, Chicken Kitchen USA, LLC recently paid $2 million to...

Mitsubishi Ordered to Pay $11 Million in Products Liability SUV Wrongful Death Case
A Florida jury has ordered Mitsubishi Motors to pay almost $11 mil...

Massachusetts Supreme Court Says Doctor's Liability Goes Beyond Patient
From The Boston Globe today: "BOSTON — A doctor who failed to wa...

New Baptist Covenant Blog
Last week, I pointed to the New Baptist Convenant website, now onl...