Taco Bell sued

Woman: Razor blade in salad cut her tongue

August 9, 2005

KATE KELLY\Frontiersman reporter

A Wasilla homemaker who was thinking "outside the bun" when she bought a chicken taco salad at the Wasilla Taco Bell in April was soon wondering why, after a sharp object inside the salad sliced her tongue.

Tammy Shinn, 43, claims she bit down on a metal blade a little more than twice the size of a dime, causing "profuse bleeding and intense pain" when it left a half-centimeter laceration on her tongue, according to a personal-injury lawsuit she filed against Taco Bell's parent company Denali Foods, Inc. last Friday in Palmer Superior Court.

"She could have come really close to death or serious surgery if she'd swallowed the razor blade," her attorney, Chadwick McGrady, said Monday of the April 23 incident, adding he believes his client is legitimate and did not fabricate the incident, like the California woman who claimed in March that she found a severed finger tip in a fast-food meal. "If I didn't believe [Shinn], I'd still be going to Taco Bell. I'm single and don't cook, so I used to go there all the time."

According to Shinn, she had purchased a chicken taco salad at the Taco Bell located at the Parks-Palmer-Wasilla highways intersection and took it home to eat it. When she bit into the salad, she noticed a sharp pain to her tongue and realized there was some sort of razor blade in her mouth.

"The razor blade was mixed in with other ingredients of the Taco Bell salad," the complaint stated. "Plaintiff called for her son to get some ice to control the bleeding."

According to a photo submitted as part of the court filing, the razor blade Shinn found is different from the kind of blade people shave with. It has two oblong holes on either side, as if it is supposed to be attached to something with screws or bolts.

When Shinn took the blood-stained blade to the restaurant later that day, a Taco Bell manager named Jennifer reportedly told her the blade might have come from meat-processing equipment used when the chicken was being prepared for distribution to Taco Bell.

However, when contacted by the Frontiersman Monday, neither Jennifer nor Taco Bell's area coach, Cindy Champion, acknowledged even knowing about the incident.

"Anything like that would be reported to me immediately," Champion said, adding that she's only been the coach for that Taco Bell since early June. "Anything like that wouldn't be swept under the rug."

Such a statement angered McGrady.

"It really irks me that both the manager and the coach said they hadn't heard of the case," McGrady said Monday. "My client even wrote the manager's name on her receipt when she went in there to show them the blade. If they can't remember it happening, then either they're trying not to remember it, or it happens so often it didn't mean anything to them. Is this a daily occurrence there?"

McGrady said Denali Foods' insurance companies - Wachovia, the Fireman's Fund, and St. Paul Traveler's - contacted Shinn four days after the incident.

"There was definitely some knowledge of it by the company," McGrady said.

Shinn received a tetanus shot and hepatitis test from Dr. Thomas Check at the AIC Urgent Care facility in Wasilla shortly after the incident, the lawsuit stated. The doctor recommended Shinn irrigate her wounded tongue with a syringe and follow up with her own doctor to make sure infection did not set in.

McGrady said the follow-up appointment with Shinn's doctor showed that her wound is healing fine.

Shinn chose not to speak with the Frontiersman for this story.

Denali Foods attorney Richard M. Rossten said Monday he was not familiar with the case and so could not comment on it yet.

McGrady said if Denali Foods is going to blame the meat-processing company, claiming it has no control over the product before it arrives at their restaurants, the company would be shirking its responsibilities.

In the lawsuit, which demands a trial by jury, McGrady argued that Denali Foods Inc. is "under a duty to protect Plaintiff from the presence of unwholesome and deleterious foreign objects in its taco salad," and that the company "made an implied warranty under [Alaska Statute 45.02.314] that the taco salad would be fit for consumption, safe, and of merchantable quality."

Contact Kate Kelly at 352-2284.