By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-01-16 21:56:37 | Updated at 2025-01-17 06:08:19
8 hours ago
A Texas teenager is suing a barbecue chain for $1million after she claims she suffered second-degree burns from spilling hot barbecue sauce.
Genesis Monita, 19, and her sister went to Bill Miller in San Antonio to get four breakfast tacos before heading to school on May 19, 2023.
After receiving their food in the drive-through line, she drove them into a space in the restaurant's parking lot to eat.
She claims in court filings the barbeque sauce container was extremely hot when she took it out and it led to her dropping it - causing burns on her upper right thigh.
'Bill Miller was negligent in giving her "dangerously hot" barbecue sauce, not providing her a container that was "adequate" to contain the condiment and failing to warn her that that the sauce was hot,' the lawsuit states.
Attorney Lawrence Morales II who is representing the teenager told the jury on January 15 the chain had violated their safety policy about food temperatures.
'Bill Miller’s unequivocal policy is they will serve their sauce at 165 degrees. Bill Miller violated their safety policy and allowed their barbecue sauce to heat up to a dangerous 189 degrees.'
He also claimed they further violated their policy by handing the sauce over in a four-ounce plastic cup rather than a Styrofoam cup.
Genesis Monita, 19, and her sister had gone to the Bill Miller at Old Pearsall Road and Loop 410 in San Antonio (pictured) to get four breakfast tacos with some barbecue sauce before heading to school on May 19, 2023
Morales said restaurants must warn customers if their food or serving containers are dangerously hot and claimed that the chain has failed to do so this time.
However Bill Miller attorney Barry McClenahan hit back against the allegations and said that Monita’s own negligence was the 'proximate cause' of the incident.
He told jurors that the 165-degree temperature stated in the policy is a minimum temperature to comply with food safety rules.
The policy does not prohibit the sauce from being heated to 189 degrees.
'What would we have warned Ms. Monita of that she did not already know? She had the sauce a hundred times, and it was always the same temperature
'At Bill Miller’s, the sauce is always hot, and our customers know that. And that’s why it’s hot,' McClenahan said.
Referencing the use of plastic cups, he told the court that the manufacturers had said they were safe up to 230 degrees.
The trial is expected to continue for the rest of the week.
This comes the same day reports emerged of a California doctor suing a Thai restaurant after ordering a dish that she deemed to be 'unfit for human consumption,' claiming that she suffered chemical burns after dining there.
She claims in court filings that the barbeque sauce container was extremely hot when she took it out and it led to her dropping it - causing burns on her upper right thigh
Bill Miller attorney Barry McClenahan hit back against the allegations and said that Monita’s own negligence was the 'proximate cause' of the incident
Coup de Thai, a Los Gatos Thai restaurant in the wealthy South Bay city's downtown area, offers an appetizer called 'Dragon Balls' - a fried, spicy chicken ball with mint, shallot, green onion, cilantro, kaffir lime leaves, chili and rice powder, served hot.
But after Harjasleen Walia, a San Jose neurologist, ordered the $11 appetizer on a night out with a friend, she claimed that it caused a painful and irreversible outcome.
The lawsuit claimed that 'she incurred permanent injuries and will forever be damaged,' Silicon Valley reported.
Walia alleged that the dish was so spicy, she suffered chemical burns to her vocal cords, esophagus and the inside of her right nostril - leading to destruction of her voice and throat.
She is seeking more than $35,000 in medical expenses, lost income, and damages in a lawsuit filed through the Santa Clara County Superior Court.
