In case your “trace of lime” Tostitos didn’t have sufficient lime, would you make a federal case out of it? What when you discovered your TGI Friday’s “Crunchy Fries” have been truly baked? Or that your mint chocolate chip ice cream was mint-flavored? Would you head to court docket and sue?
Spencer Sheehan has – submitting these and greater than 800 different related class-action instances in federal and state courts throughout the nation, largely over the previous three years – together with scores of lawsuits right here in Illinois. The legal professional from Lengthy Island has been nicknamed “the Vanilla Vigilante” by a bunch of media retailers, as a result of he’s repeatedly challenged the vanilla flavoring added to a number of manufacturers of ice cream.
In truth it was simply such a case that not too long ago introduced Sheehan and his purchasers some notoriety in October, when Breyer’s settled a case Sheehan filed, claiming the corporate’s “pure” vanilla ice cream ought to have talked about on the label that it additionally contained synthetic vanilla. Breyer’s didn’t admit any fault, however did comply with a settlement of $8.85 million, plus greater than $200 thousand in charges.
“If anyone sells you one thing that’s claiming it’s pure vanilla ice cream, then that’s what individuals ought to be getting,” Sheehan stated. “And when it’s not, properly then that’s an issue… It’s promoting one thing that really you have been capable of present was priced larger that it will be.”
Accordingly, Sheehan stated, his class-action plaintiffs will possible get refunded for nonetheless many cartons of ice cream they purchased “with a view to be made entire” whereas, in line with court docket data, Sheehan and the opposite plaintiff attorneys obtained roughly $3 million of the settlement for themselves (a 33% legal professional price is typical in these kinds of instances).
However for each (uncommon) multi-million-dollar settlement Sheehan will get, he information tons of of different instances which – for probably the most half – go nowhere.
NBC 5 Investigates examined 150 of his instances in Illinois’ federal courts, filed over a three-year interval. Sheehan, representing a distinct native plaintiff for every case, has challenged (for instance) the quantity of lemon in seltzer water; eggs described as “farm contemporary;” “wealthy and creamy” sweet that doesn’t have a lot dairy and a film studio, which dropped the plaintiff’s favourite actress from the ultimate minimize of a movie.
In every case, Sheehan often claims that his class-action plaintiffs have suffered damages of greater than $5 million.
“We’d characterize [these cases] as largely abusive,” says Orianna Senatore, managing director and senior vp of technique for the U.S. Chamber Institute for Authorized Reform.
“The forms of instances that [Sheehan] information are actually type of a stereotypical enterprise mannequin,” she stated, “which is to check a principle, see the place it sticks, push it again and again in type of a copy-and-paste type of method, till it runs out of steam after which transfer on to one thing else.”
Spencer Sheehan disagrees.
“To the extent that anyone may describe such lawsuits as frivolous, properly – that’s a standard chorus that opponents of client empowerment have waved for many years,” he stated. “Fortunately we’re not deterred from doing what we do properly.”
However NBC 5 Investigates discovered that when Sheehan information his instances right here, Chicago’s federal judges typically rapidly dismiss them – most continuously for failure to state any form of respectable declare. And in a couple of of these instances, these judges put their frustrations with Sheehan in writing.
Take a case that Sheehan filed in Chicago in 2022, difficult the quantity of lemon in Polar Pure Seltzer. The federal district decide in that case, Decide Steven C. Seeger, dismissed the grievance and wrote an opinion concerning the native lady Sheehan had named because the plaintiff:
“[The plaintiff] apparently was none to happy to find that the 12-pack of carbonated water contained a 12-pack of carbonated water,” Seeger wrote. “She apparently wished the cans of water to comprise a bunch of juice. Not just a bit juice – an enormous squeeze of lemon juice, proper in every can. She was so troubled with the cans that she marched to the federal courthouse. She believes that the packaging is deceptive as a result of it makes use of the phrase ‘lemon.’ The speculation isn’t that the can says ‘lemon,’ however there isn’t a lemon. The cans apparently do, in truth, comprise a bit lemon. As a substitute, the speculation is that [the plaintiff] thought that there can be extra lemon. So she makes an enormous fuss about a bit lemon.”
“The grievance fizzles, and has not juice.”
Decide Seeger dismissed a number of different native fits of Sheehan’s, culminating on this opinion, after he threw out Sheehan’s grievance {that a} model of mayonnaise made with olive oil, truly had extra soybean oil than olive oil:
“The shelf lifetime of the grievance has lengthy since expired. In truth, the speculation of the case was previous its prime from the very second that it arrived within the federal courthouse. Plaintiff’s counsel has peddled this principle repeatedly, in case after case, with out a lot success on this district. The grievance joins a warehouse of complaints filed by Plaintiff’s counsel that aren’t match for public consumption.”
“At this level, this Courtroom has gone ‘spherical and ‘around the carousel quite a lot of instances with Plaintiff’s counsel in instances about misleading product labeling. … In every case, the plaintiff unsuccessfully alleged that the product misled customers as a result of they anticipated it to comprise greater than a de minimis quantity of an ingredient marketed on the label. The identical legal professional filed every case. The case at hand is one more spin on an more and more disagreeable experience. It’s time for the carousel to come back to a halt.”
One other native federal decide, Iain D. Johnston, added this, when he dismissed a declare wherein Sheehan and his plaintiff complained that Trident Unique Taste Sugar Free Gum featured a drawing of a mint leaf on its wrapper however didn’t comprise precise mint:
“[Plaintiff] pleads the proverbial kitchen sink. The sort of blunderbuss pleading leaves the reader questioning if any of the claims have advantage.
“Spaghetti is finest eaten, not thrown at partitions.”
Oriana Senatore stated that Illinois’ lack of caps on damages — which she stated permits individuals to sue even once they have suffered no hurt — makes this state an particularly interesting place for Sheehan — and different attorneys like him — to file these kinds of claims. She additionally stated Illinois permits a extra lax commonplace for professional testimony.
“And so we discovered – not surprisingly – a cottage of business of plaintiffs’ attorneys have moved into Illinois and produce these instances – solely these instances – as a result of they’re really easy to carry, and so profitable, given the shortage of caps,” Senatore stated.
Her group – the U.S. Chamber’s Institute for Authorized Reform – has compiled information which, they stated, present that the rising variety of tort claims — like these filed by Sheehan — is costing the general public increasingly more every year, in courtroom time and litigation charges.
“I might say the one public price is the associated fee that buyers are getting taken for, once they purchase one thing that wasn’t what it claimed to be,” Sheehan stated. “And what we’re doing – not simply me – is to attempt to equalize that price.”
Sheehan has, nonetheless, run into some latest difficulties.
In 2023, a number of judges in New York made public observe of his “frivolous instances,” and this previous summer season, a court docket in Florida sanctioned Sheehan for submitting a go well with “in unhealthy religion” when he claimed {that a} bag of espresso marketed too many servings. Sheehan is interesting the sanction.
Sheehan admits that he doesn’t hold shut monitor of all his instances. So – is that a sign that they is likely to be clogging up the system?
Sheehan’s reply is straightforward: “What else is the court docket doing?”
