Household of Dancer, 25, with Peanut Allergy Recordsdata Wrongful Demise Lawsuit

The property of Órla Baxendale, a 25-year-old skilled dancer with a extreme nut allergy who died in January after allegedly consuming mislabeled Florentine cookies, filed a wrongful demise lawsuit towards the grocery retailer that offered the cookies.

Within the lawsuit filed on Might 23 and reviewed by PEOPLE, the attorneys representing the property allege that Baxendale died “on account of the gross negligence and reckless indifference to the rights of others and an intentional and wanton violation of these rights by” the grocery store, Stew Leonard’s, and the cookies’ producer, Cookies United. Each the grocery store and producer are listed as defendants. The lawsuit was filed in Superior Court docket in Waterbury, Conn.

A spokesperson for Stew Leonard’s informed PEOPLE that they can not touch upon pending litigation. PEOPLE additionally reached out to the final counsel for Cookies United.

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Baxendale ate the Florentine Cookies on Jan. 11, in line with the lawsuit. On Jan. 24, her household’s attorneys launched a press release claiming she died of anaphylactic shock that day, echoing claims made within the criticism. Officers from the Connecticut Division of Shopper Safety (DCP) and the Connecticut Division of Public Well being (DPH) additionally mentioned in January they had been investigating the incident.

Bexendale had an EpiPen together with her, however her allergy was too extreme, her household’s attorneys mentioned in a January assertion. “After she started to have an anaphylactic response, an EpiPen was used however because of the severity of her allergy, it was not efficient,” legal professional Marijo C. Adime claimed on the time.

The dancer, “like all customers, relied upon the producer and vendor to correctly label the package deal offered to most of the people,” the lawsuit reads.

The lawsuit calls the failure to correctly label the cookies “grossly negligent, intentional, reckless, callous, detached to human life, and a wanton violation because the producer and vendor had been required below the regulation to correctly declare the components.”

Stew Leonard’s recalled each the chocolate and vanilla forms of the Florentine Cookies made by Cookies United resulting from a labeling error, in line with a Connecticut State Division of Shopper Safety alert from Jan. 23. The grocery store acknowledged that one individual died presumably due to the error. On Jan. 25, the grocery store warned customers that the cookies contained undeclared eggs and peanuts.

“Stew Leonard’s is working with the Connecticut Division of Shopper Safety and the provider to find out the reason for the labeling error,” the Jan. 25 assertion learn. “Clients who’ve bought these cookies ought to deliver again the product to Stew Leonard’s customer support for a full refund.”

Stew Leonard’s CEO Stew Leonard Jr. issued a video assertion on Baxendale’s demise, sharing his condolences together with her household. “The provider modified the recipe and began going from soy nuts to peanuts and our chief security officer at Stew Leonard’s was by no means notified,” Leonard Jr. claimed within the video.

Nonetheless, Cookies United issued a press launch on Jan. 23, alleging that the misprinted label “was created by, and utilized to, their product by Stew Leonard’s.” The corporate additionally included paperwork it claims confirmed it informed Stew Leonard’s staff in regards to the recipe change in July 2023.

“On July 20, 2023, roughly six months previous to this tragic demise, a minimum of eleven staff of the Stew Leonard’s Defendants, had been notified by electronic mail of the change in components, together with the addition of peanuts to the cookie recipe, by the defendant cookie producer, Cookies United LLC,” the lawsuit reads. 

The lawsuit alleges that Stew Leonard’s “ignored” the e-mail and “by no means modified the label or the diet reality panel and by no means correctly up to date the packaging.” The grocery store chain’s system to “preserve and replace the correct labels was damaged, unreliable, inherently harmful, undependable, untrustworthy, erratic, and deplorable,” the lawsuit claims.