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Family wins $40,000 over food tainted with urine by North Platte Bulletin Staff - 7/14/2008 A police officer from Sidney and his family won $40,000 from a restaurant that served them food tainted with an employee’s spit and urine. Officer Keith Andrew and his wife said in the lawsuit that a Taco Bell employee urinated and spit in food served to them and their children in October 2005. The owner of the restaurant is North Platte’s Mid-Plains Food and Lodging, owner of a KFC and Taco Bell here too. The jury sided with the Andrews July 11. In the lawsuit,...

Here comes Big George again. Billionaire George Soros is weighing in heavily with more cash, delivering $2.5 million to a new political organization called Fund for America. According to a year-end campaign report filed with the Internal Revenue Service and uncovered by The Times' Dan Morain, Fund for America was organized by Taco Bell heir Rob McKay, former Clinton White House Chief of Staff John Podesta and Anna Burger of the Service Employees International Union. The SEIU matched Soros with another $2.5 million, too. Other major donors include investor Donald Sussman, who has given $1 million and AKT Development of...

It sounds like a fast-food grudge match: Taco Bell is taking on the homeland of its namesake by reopening for the first time in 15 years in Mexico. Defenders of Mexican culture see the chain's re-entry as a crowning insult to a society already overrun by U.S. chains from Starbucks and Subway to KFC. "It's like bringing ice to the Arctic," complained pop-culture historian Carlos Monsiváis. The company's branding strategy — "Taco Bell is something else" — is an attempt to distance itself from any comparison to Mexico's beloved taquerias, which sell traditional corn tortillas stuffed with an endless variety...

Ron Paul doesn't understand his own success. He didn't know his calls for an end to the Federal Reserve and the Department of Education would draw cheers, that his anti-income tax, anti-foreign intervention and libertarian message would resonate. He was reluctant to run for the Republican presidential nomination, he said yesterday: He was convinced it would take another "generation for education" before his message - rooted in Paul's reading of the Constitution - gained traction. "I have been just dumbfounded about what's happening," Paul said yesterday in Manchester's Veteran's Park, where roughly 500 supporters gathered for a glimpse of the...

Ron Paul supporters are raising a ruckus because WorldNetDaily columnist Melanie Morgan wrote not-nice words about Paul's presidential campaign. Here's the Digg thread where the Ron Paul supporters are flipping out: HERE'S THE DIGG PAGE WITH THE COMMENTS FROM THE RON PAUL CROWD And here's the excerpt from Melanie's column at WorldNetDaily. You can read her full column - HERE. ________________________________________ RON PAUL: Poor Ron Paul – it's tough to be the candidate of the conspiracy crowd and maintain any shred of credibility. This week, Paul had to denounce his own supporters who mobbed Rudy Giuliani on a Michigan ferry...

CHICAGO - Late on a balmy Friday night in Wicker Park, a gentrifying neighborhood just northwest of the Loop, a small tribe of 20-somethings gathers outside a corner bar. Their leader, a petite, energetic 25-year-old named Meghann Walker, hands out leaflets to people heading inside. "Do you guys know Ron Paul is going to be in town tomorrow?" Walker asks a short-haired young woman in jeans and flip-flops. "There'll be a lot of good people there, that's for sure."

The other day I was driving past a very busy Intersection in my neck of the woods and I noticed a Ron Paul Revolution sign had gone up. There were a couple more on the toll way that some farmer had put up. These were put there on private property by people that most likely were not paid to do so. That’s the way Ron Paul supporters are. They don’t have to be asked to do something for their candidate. They don’t have to be told to go out and campaign. They simply do what they can, or what they...

The Southern California farm that grew the green onions that were first linked to and then cleared in last year’s E. coli outbreak has filed a libel lawsuit against Taco Bell Corp. Boskovich Farms, Inc. filed the lawsuit last week in Orange County Superior Court, alleging the Yum! Brands Inc. (YUM) unit continued to link its green onions to the December outbreak that sickened more than 70 people in the Northeast despite knowing the produce was not contaminated. “Taco Bell engaged in an irresponsible and intentional crusade to save its own brand at the expense of an innocent supplier,“ Thomas...

It has been eighteen months since Katrina devastated homes and businesses in the city and still hundreds of places remain closed. Many local mom and pop shops don’t have the funds to reopen and their places remain abandoned. But most of the national chains that do business in the city of New Orleans and in other devastated areas have either gutted, demolished or reopened their stores. With one notable exception: At least four Taco Bell restaurants in New Orleans East and St. Bernard remain much as they were when Katrina hit – laying wide open with rotted food, broken glass...

NEW YORK CITY -- More rats -- now a different restaurant. This time an au bon pain on third avenue where WNBC recorded these two rats inside the popular bakery just last night. "I've eaten here before waiting for the bus and now I will never go in there again," said a former customer. It's the second restaurant to draw attention since the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene closed this rat-infested KFC-Taco Bell in Greenwich Village. That restaurant actually passed inspection the day before the rats were discovered but now. "So are there any other possibilities other...

Rats have taken over a fast-food restaurant in New York City's Greenwich Village. (WNYW Image) Compiled by MyFox Staff Reports NEW YORK -- Aww, rats. That's what people are saying about a fast-food restaurant in New York City's Greenwich Village. And those are the rodents that have taken over at the KFC/Taco Bell on 6th Avenue and 4th Street. A viewer called a local television station in New York to give a tip, and a short time later, Fox's local affiliate, WNYW, was shooting live video for its morning show of about a dozen rats prancing around the dining room...

See for example this thread first.E. coli, produce, Taco Bell This combo's beginning to smell If enough folks get ill I fear that they will end up in abogado hell!

Lettuce has been identified as the most likely source of an E. coli outbreak linked to Taco Bell.

Maybe the green onions were not the culprit after all. As the number of confirmed or suspected cases of E. coli infection rose to 400 yesterday, federal officials said that their testing had failed to confirm preliminary findings by Taco Bell that some green onions in its restaurants were contaminated. The chain removed green onions from its restaurants last week. “There’s nothing to implicate green onions right now,” said Dr. David Acheson, chief medical officer for food safety at the federal Food and Drug Administration. “We have not ruled out any food ingredient. We haven’t ruled any in, and we...

NEW YORK — Nearly three dozen people fell ill, including 14 who were hospitalized, with symptoms consistent with infection by the E. coli bacteria after eating at a Taco John's restaurant, a local health department said. Test results were expected Monday. The Taco John's restaurant has removed any suspected ingredients from its menu and sanitized the facility, said Tom O'Rourke, the Black Hawk County Health Department director.

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (AP) -- A woman shot in her car while waiting in a Taco Bell drive-thru can sue the restaurant on grounds that it had lax security, the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled. A Wells County judge originally ruled against Sonya Winchell, but the appeals court found Taco Bell had a duty to ensure her safety and a jury should decide whether it tried to do so.

"The expanding outbreak of E. coli poisonings in New York, New Jersey and several other states underscores the need for more rigorous regulation of the whole supply chain for fresh produce . . . Surely it is time to give government regulators the power and resources they need to ensure the safety of fresh fruits and vegetables." - NY Times editorial, Sickened by Fresh Produce, 12/09/06 "[Taco Bell owner] Yum Brands is feeling the financial fallout on Wall Street, as two analysts downgraded its stock, citing the potential effects of customers' food safety concerns. Shares fell $1.36 to $59.72...

New Jersey asks Taco Bells to throw out their foodBy Nichola GroomLOS ANGELES (Reuters) - New Jersey health officials addressing an E.coli outbreak on Wednesday asked Taco Bell restaurants in the state to throw out all their food and better train workers in hygiene and food handling. At least 47 people in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania have been infected with E.coli in the last few weeks, and dozens more potential cases are being investigated. Many of the infected people had eaten at Taco Bell prior to becoming sick, the states said. New York state officials on Wednesday raised...

Number Of Confirmed Cases In N.Y., N.J. Reaches 39 Source Of Bacteria Undetermined, But Food Products Sent To Labs For Testing (CBS/AP) TRENTON, N.J. At least 14 people in two counties on Long Island have been affected by the recent E. coli outbreak that was first reported in central New Jersey. Officials say three people in Nassau County and 11 people in Suffolk County are being treated in the outbreak, though there is no confirmation yet as to whether the outbreak in New Jersey and the one in New York are related. Eight Taco Bell restaurants on Long Island have...

A Stafford County teenager is paying a stiff price for spitting into a customer's drink at a fast-food restaurant last month. Shaleesheya G. Ford, 18, was ordered to serve six months in jail after pleading guilty to three misdemeanors Thursday in Stafford General District Court. Ford, a high school junior, was also ordered to not work in the food industry for three years and to stay off all Taco Bell properties statewide for the same period. Ford pleaded guilty to assault and battery, obstruction of justice and filing a false police report. She was taken to the Rappahannock Regional Jail...

On my way home from the second job I've taken for the extra holiday ca$h I need, I stopped at Taco Bell for a quick bite to eat. In my billfold is a $50 bill and a $2 bill. That is all of the cash I have on my person. I figure that with a $2 bill, I can get something to eat and not have to worry about people getting upset at me. ME: ``Hi, I'd like one seven layer burrito please, to go.'' IT: ``Is that it?'' ME: ``Yep.'' IT: ``That'll be $1.04, eat here?'' ME: ``No, it's...

It turned out to be a beautiful day, temp hit 70, and I got the urge to ride the little motorscooter. Coming home, I pulled into Taco Bell. I sat in the driveway for several minutes with no results, then pulled around to the window. I waited there, watching 2 girls drag wet rags around on the counters, and finally, one of them noticed me. I gave her my order, she vanished into the rear if the store, and the manager appeared, almost gnashing his teeth. I gave him my order, and asked him why he was so angry. His...

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- A 15-year-old boy allegedly killed his father then set their home on fire because he was afraid his father would find out he was failing some classes, prosecutors said. Ryan Watts was charged Friday with murdering his father, 50-year-old John E. Bruner, who was initially believed to have died in the fire earlier this week. He was charged as an adult. Watts was arrested Wednesday after an autopsy determined that Bruner died from multiple gunshot wounds and not from the fire, Santa Clara police said. According to court documents, Watts told police he took a .45-caliber...

The head of the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. has endorsed a call for McDonalds to improve working conditions and raise the pay of its tomato pickers. In a letter released on Wednesday, the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk of the two-million-member denomination, challenged the fast food chain giant to “put an end to human rights violations” by bringing an “adequate solution to the grievous conditions and sub-poverty wages of farmworkers.” "Farmworkers are explicitly excluded from the National Labor Relations Act, which denies them the right to organize, the right to negotiate with their employers, and the right to appeal grievances to...

Vote YES on Sweeney-Spratt Agriculture Amendment to End Horse Slaughter The U.S. House is expected to vote on June 8 or 9 on the Sweeney-Spratt amendment to prevent tax dollars from being used to promote horse slaughter. Please take action right now—send an email and make a phone call to urge your U.S. Representative to vote YES on the Sweeney-Spratt Amendment. Americans love horses—they are our trusted companions, our Olympic heroes, and our loyal work animals. Polls show time and time again that Americans don't support slaughtering our horses for foreign dinner plates. This travesty must be stopped...and by taking...

Day after day, for more than two weeks, the 76-year-old man sat trapped and alone in his attic, sipping from a dwindling supply of water until it ran out. No food. No way out of a house ringed by foul floodwaters. Without ever leaving home, Gerald Martin lived out one of the most remarkable survival stories of Hurricane Katrina. Rescuers who found him Friday, as they searched his neighborhood by boat, were astounded at his good spirits and resiliency after 18 days without food or human contact. "It's an incredible story of survival," said Louie Fernandez, spokesman for the Federal...

IMMOKALEE, Fla. - Tejano music bounced off the one-story buildings of this farming town and the smell of tamales filled the air as scores of revelers danced into the night outside the headquarters of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. The celebration marked a hard-fought, unlikely victory by a group of mostly Guatemalan and Mexican tomato pickers over one of the nation's fast-food giants, Taco Bell. They led a four-year boycott against the chain until it agreed in March to pay a penny more per pound for Florida tomatoes and adopt a code of conduct that would allow Taco Bell to...

Double-Swiping Employee Pleads Guilty Sat Apr 9, 5:21 PM ET Strange News - AP SALT LAKE CITY - A 21-year-old fast-food employee has been sentenced to probation and six months in jail for double-swiping the credit cards of customers who irritated him. Travis Dominguez pleaded guilty to one count of credit card fraud, a third-degree felony. He was accused of doubled-swiping cards at the Midvale Taco Bell where he worked five times, putting in different amounts on the second swipe between $20 and $30. Third District Judge Glenn Iwasaki ordered a psychological evaluation and $142.22 restitution, and barred Dominguez from...

Taco Bell Corp., a subsidiary of Yum! Brands, Inc., (NYSE: YUM), is seeking to purchase the Liberty Bell. If the sale goes through, the the historic artifact would be renamed the "Taco Liberty Bell", and displayed in front of their corporate headquarters. Taco Bell is the nation’s leading Mexican-style quick service restaurant chain serving tacos, burritos, signature Quesadillas, Border Bowls®, nachos and other specialty items. Taco Bell serves more than 35 million consumers each week in more than 6,500 restaurants in the U.S. In 2003, Taco Bell generated sales of $1.6 billion in company restaurants and $3.8 billion in franchise...

Farmworker advocates on Tuesday ended a three-year boycott of Taco Bell after the fast-food giant agreed to improve working conditions and require suppliers to raise wages.....Meeting in Louisville, Ky., company officials announced they would require suppliers to increase the wages paid to tomato pickers by a penny a pound while pledging to help farmworker advocates gain similar concessions from others in the fast-food industry.

MIDVALE, Utah - Talk about upsizing. Travis Dominguez, 20, has been accused of double-swiping the credit cards of what he considered to be irritating customers at a Taco Bell drive-through. "The customers he did it to annoyed him somehow, and he did it for revenge," said Midvale police Detective Scott Nesbitt. Dominguez didn't indicate how the customers annoyed him, Nesbitt said. Dominguez allegedly doubled-swiped credit cards five times, putting in different amounts on the second swipe, anywhere between $20 to $30. Dominguez faces five felony counts of unlawful use of a credit card, and single misdemeanor counts of theft and...

Yum! Brands, the parent company of Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, KFC, A&W and Long John Silver’s, has stopped advertising on the ABC Network show Desperate Housewives. The move comes after the company’s headquarters were flooded with e-mails and phone calls from concerned customers. Jonathan Blum, senior vice president of public affairs for Yum! Brands, announced the decision in a letter dated November 17, 2004, to Bill Johnson, president of the American Decency Association (ADA). As posted on ADA’s Web site, the letter reads: I wanted to inform you that Yum! Brands will not be advertising in Desperate Housewives going forward....

"My family is more important to me than my party," declared  Senator Zell Miller, a Georgia Democrat, as he spoke from the podium of the Republican National Convention on September 1. "There is but one man to whom I am willing to entrust their future and that man's name is George Bush." [1] Many Democrats howled in outrage at Miller's "betrayal" - former President Jimmy Carter in particular. In an angry personal letter to the Georgia senator, Carter accused Miller of "unprecedented disloyalty" and declared, "You have betrayed our trust. [I]t's quite possible that your rabid speech damaged our party..." [2] But...

Please, Drop the Chalupa Tuesday, June 08, 2004 An Iowa man has been arrested for assault with an airborne chalupa, reports the Des Moines Register. "I've never had anything quite like that before," police detective Darren Cornwell told the newspaper. Nancy Harrison was working the drive-through window at a Des Moines Taco Bell (search) Thursday evening when 24-year-old Christopher Lame pulled up and ordered food, Harrison told police. Lame got and paid for his food, but a little while later walked into the restaurant to complain he hadn't gotten what he'd ordered. Harrison asked him if he had his receipt....

SO MUCH FOR TACO BELL I vote with my dollars. I don't shop at Wal-Mart because I don't appreciate Wal-Mart's disdain for the private property rights of American citizens. Now I'm adding Taco Bell to the list. No ... I'm not asking you to do the same. I'm just telling you what I'm going to do. Taco Bell, you see, is asking customers for cute little sayings, "words of wisdom" they call it, to be printed on their little packets of hot sauce. Taco bell put out a little press release announcing the search for these "words of wisdom" and...

Irvine, CA--(HISPANIC PR WIRE - BUSINESS WIRE)--May 19, 2004--Taco Bell(R) is giving customers a taste of fame by publishing their "words of wisdom" on the nearly 5 billion sauce packets distributed to restaurants each year, in the company's Share Your Sauce Wisdom national contest launching today. Up to 12 customers will be selected to have their Taco Bell-inspired sayings on sauce packets in Taco Bell(R) restaurants nationwide and will receive a one-year supply of free food. "We're putting our customers' words on the hottest place on the menu - our sauce packets," said Greg Creed, chief marketing officer, Taco Bell...

<p>FOUNTAIN HILLS - Authorities say a 39-year-old Taco Bell manager forced a 17-year-old female employee to strip and endure a body search after a caller posing as a police officer gave him instructions to do so at the Fountain Hills restaurant this week.</p>

Manager strip-searched teen Act ordered by caller claiming to be police 08:41 PM CST on Saturday, March 27, 2004 Associated Press FOUNTAIN HILLS, Ariz. - Authorities are investigating a report that a manager of a fast-food restaurant conducted a strip search of a teenage female customer. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said an unidentified caller pretending to be a police officer directed the 39-year-old manager of a Taco Bell restaurant to conduct the search Monday after giving a general description of a theft suspect. The girl, a 17-year-old high school student, was taken to a back room. There, she was...

Students, Workers Protest Taco Bell Vernon Ng - After participating in a 44-mile march, college students, farm workers and other anti-Taco Bell supports gather to watch singers, bands and political figures make statements against the alleged unfair labor condition of farm workers. United Coalition of Immokalee Workers held a rally in front of the Taco Bell corporate offices on March 5 to protest the alleged unfair labor conditions of agricultural workers in Immokalee, Fla. These workers are responsible for picking the tomatoes used by Taco Bells nationwide. They arrived at Taco Bell headquarters after a 44-mile march that began...

DES MOINES (AP) -- A former employee of Taco Bell has filed a lawsuit claiming his boss defamed him and humiliated him in front of a witness. James A. Egenberger, 22, filed a lawsuit in Polk County District Court against Taco Bell seeking damages for personal humiliation, embarrassment and emotion distress arising out of his September 2002 firing from a Taco Bell in West Des Moines. Court records show that store manager Randy Vinzant accused of Egenberger of being a thief in front of other employees and customers. Vinzant was later found to be responsible for $2,500 in store receipts...

Clifton Kirkpatrick, the stated clerk of the Presbyterian Church (USA), has coaxed his allies in the National Council of Churches to join the PCUSA's boycott of Taco Bell. "Any time a Christian community comes together and seeks to exercise economic justice in this way, it is because there is a very serious injustice that cannot be resolved in any other way," said the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, one of leaders of the social-activist ecumenical body which held its annual assembly in Jackson, Miss., on Nov. 6-8. Kirkpatrick introduced the resolution calling on the NCC to join a tomato-picker's labor union in...

IRVINE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 6, 2003--The people of California have spoken and eaten ... and it's Arnold they want. After a seven-week run, Taco Bell(R) today announced the final gubernatorial Taco Poll results with Arnold Schwarzenegger winning by a high margin of tacos. The candidate seized 81 percent of votes for the crunchy beef taco. The Grilled Stuft Burrito, representing 133 candidates, came in second with 13 percent of votes. Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, with the Chalupa, finished with 5 percent of votes, while Gov. Gray Davis, with the chicken soft taco, came in last place with 1 percent of votes....

Tiny dog costs Taco Bell big http://www.jewishworldreview.com | (KRT) Dinky, the Chihuahua who led the taco revolution, has taken another bite out of "the Bell." A federal judge ordered Taco Bell on Thursday to pay an additional $11.8 million in interest to the two Michigan men who created the idea of the talking dog, which was best known to TV viewers for uttering, "Yo quiero Taco Bell." The award brings the total verdict against the Mexican fast-food chain to about $42 million, said Doug Dozeman, an attorney with Grand Rapids, Mich.-based Warner, Norcross & Judd, which represented Joseph Shields and...

The number of Western chicken, pizza and burrito restaurants dotting city streets is set to grow as Yum! Brands Inc. pushes to increase the Russian presence of the restaurants whose trademark it holds, including household name eateries like KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. Yum! is one of the world's largest global franchising networks; the 34,000 restaurants operating under its brands made $22 billion in 2002. By sales it is surpassed only by McDonald's. Twenty percent of these 34,000 are owned by Yum! itself while the others are franchises it licenses other firms to run. Steve Varsano, head of European...

California Democratic Party leaders yesterday blasted the Taco Bell restaurant chain for a sales promotion that counts sales of different menu items as votes in a mock California recall election. Last week the Mexican-style fast food chain launched the campaign, urging Californians to “put their vote where their mouth is.” Taco Bell restaurants statewide are tallying each purchase of a crunchy beef taco as a “vote” for Republican challenger Arnold Schwarzenegger and each purchase of a chicken soft taco as a “vote” for not recalling Gov. Gray Davis. In the first week of the unofficial poll, “votes” for any of...

California Democratic Party leaders yesterday blasted the Taco Bell restaurant chain for a sales promotion that counts sales of different menu items as votes in a mock California recall election. Last week the Mexican-style fast food chain launched the campaign, urging Californians to “put their vote where their mouth is.” Taco Bell restaurants statewide are tallying each purchase of a crunchy beef taco as a “vote” for Republican challenger Arnold Schwarzenegger and each purchase of a chicken soft taco as a “vote” for not recalling Gov. Gray Davis. In the first week of the unofficial poll, “votes” for any of...

David Dryer is talking about a poll that was done by ABC over the weekend that shows: AS - 45% Busta - 29 Mclnt - 11% on the Hugh Hewitt show now.

LOS ANGELES (AP) - California State Federation of Labor AFL-CIO endorses Lt. Gov Cruz Bustamante in case Gov. Gray Davis is recalled.

Bustamante, MEChA and the media Michelle Malkin Now that Democrat Cruz Bustamante is California's gubernatorial recall front-runner, we can look forward to in-depth media investigations of the Latino candidate's long-held ties to the racial separatist group MEChA, right? Ha. While Katie Couric complains about GOP candidate Arnold Schwarzenegger being "the son of a Nazi party member" and international media outlets assail Schwarzenegger adviser Pete Wilson as "anti-immigrant" and "racially divisive," the liberal press has been stone-cold silent on Bustamante's connection to one of the nation's most virulently racist organizations. As a student at Fresno State University in the 1970s, Bustamante...

Malkin Bares Bustamante's Ties to Racist Group" Columnist Michelle Malkin exposes Cruz Bustamante's link to a militant separatist group. Why haven't the media elites addressed this potentially damaging affiliation? I don't think we even need to ask. This report is by Carl Limbacher and the NewsMax staff and is reprinted by permission. NEWSMAX.COM - The media are again abetting the Democrat who have destroyed California. again abetting the ''While Katie Couric complains about GOP candidate Arnold Schwarzenegger being 'the son of a Nazi party member' and international media outlets assail Schwarzenegger adviser Pete Wilson as 'anti-immigrant' and 'racially divisive,' the...