The Subway tuna saga continues with yet another filing of the case.
Last January, two California consumers sued Subway alleging that there was no tuna in their tuna sandwiches. They even had laboratory tests to prove it but refused to disclose the actual findings. (See our first story.) The story made headlines around the world.
Subsequently, various media did independent laboratory tests of their own tuna samples with varying results. (See our second story.) Inside Edition found it did contain tuna, while a later test by the New York Times did not. Subway has refuted the NYT story.
Then in June, lawyers for the consumers without explanation completely abandoned their claim that there was no tuna in Subway tuna sandwiches, and filed an amended complaint. (See our third story.) This time they claimed that Subway’s tuna was “not 100% sustainably caught skipjack and yellowfin tuna†and thus customers were being misled.
In October, a federal court judge dismissed the case against Subway saying that the consumers did not say they had even seen the claim about the specific species of tuna used, so how could they have been misled by it. (See our fourth story.)
Now, two weeks ago, believe it or not, the consumers’ lawyers refiled their case. Now they are back to claiming that consumers are being misled because there is no tuna in Subway’s tuna sandwiches. This time, however, they hired a marine biologist who conducted DNA tests on 20 samples collected from 20 different Subway locations in California. The results…
*MOUSE PRINT:
Of the twenty samples tested, nineteen of them had no detectable tuna DNA sequences whatsoever. Additionally, the test results indicate that all twenty of the samples contained detectable sequences of chicken DNA; a majority of the samples (eleven out of twenty) contained detectable sequences of pork DNA; and some of the samples (seven out of twenty) contained detectable sequences of cattle DNA.
An attorney for Subway told the Washington Post, “The plaintiffs’ latest attempt to state a claim against Subway is just as meritless as their prior attempts. These claims are false and will be proven to be completely meritless if the case gets past the pleading stage.†He also suggested that the DNA tests done were flawed because they can’t reliably identify food that has been cooked.
So in the end, maybe Jessica Simpson asked the right question in that infamous video… is this stuff fish or chicken?
We’ll keep you posted on the outcome of round three of this fishy case.
If plaintiffs and their attorney/s were responsible for all court cost, this would go away.
They are.
I wonder what marine biologist they hired to come up with those findings??
This is a total joke imo.
Let the people filing the lawsuit pay Subway a few million for this big farce.
“It’s gotten really crowded in here, your Honor. You’re going to need a bigger court room.” ~ Roy Scheider, Jaws. What’s coming up in the 6th round? Coronavirus has been detected? This is Smear By a Thousand Cuts. Where is the counter-suit to send a message?
The Subway attorney is wrong, DNA testing can be done with cooked meat. But you have to test for specific sequences, or species. I wonder if they tested for escolar.
I was going to ask about the efficacy of testing cooked and processed meat for DNA. I’m sure it can be done, but I bet there are a lot more false positives and special steps you have to take.
Also the reports lead me to believe that this is going to be fake. I do not believe that Subway is dumb enough to have NO tuna in their tuna. If you told me they detected tuna AND other filler meat, I might believe it, but until this plays out in court I refuse to believe there is literally no tuna fish in their tuna.
This begs a different question though, who is buying tuna at Subway? I’d literally take any other sandwich on the menu. Sorry tuna lovers, but it tastes the same coming out of my can from home.
I talked to a young man at our church last summer when this whole tuna question started and he said that while he didn’t know if there was tuna in the tuna, he said that what the Subway he worked at had for “tuna” arrived in big plastic bags full of a dried, powdery substance that the workers then had to rehydrate and mix with mayonaise. He said he definitely wouldn’t eat it. As far as the claims of chicken, pork and beef DNA-maybe there is cross-contamination in the tuna from serving utensils as the sandwiches are being made?
Tuna or no tuna, it did pass my taste test when I used to patronize Subway. The reason I stopped going was their cutback with their servings. When tuna went from 4 scoops per 6″ to 3 scoops (sometimes just 2 larger scoops), that’s when I called it quits.
Similar here. Portion cut AND price hike did it for me. Used to be i there once a week like clockwork, but not for a very long time now and never again.
Could all of this be due to the woke trying to cut tuna consumption? Remember McDonald’s had to switch fish types when their consumption demand almost drove the species to extinction.