Marler: don't rule out tomatoes just yet

While the entire industry now believes that tomatoes were not involved in the salmonella outbreak, Seattle food safety lawyer Bill Marler isn't so sure. As you might suspect... From the Web site www.lawyersandsettlements.com.

For other complainants that don’t know what made them sick (tomatoes, peppers or even salsa) or where they purchased contaminated food, Marler says the situation is more problematic, i.e., trying to figure out how to get victims compensated. "Not to sound trite but you must have someone responsible, someone to sue," he says.

"For example, there are a lot of cases where people ate out multiple times and ate dishes with tomatoes and peppers," explains Marler, " and within that time frame of getting sick, if they ate on Monday and again Tuesday at different Mexican restaurants, how will you know which one had contaminated food?" Marler's firm is investigating all of those possibilities.

"Even today I am not convinced it was solely peppers responsible for the outbreak," he adds. "I think tomatoes were involved early on in the outbreak. Investigators have been able to locate a certain water source at a certain supplier in Mexico and that supplier provided both peppers and tomatoes, so the water source was contaminated with salmonella. In other words, Salmonella did not necessarily come from the grower. Then they found contaminated peppers at a warehouse in Texas.

TK: Compared with the FDA, don't discount the "traceback" investigation by Marler; he is more than motivated enough to find someone to sue, it seems.