[rabenson]

CHICAGO — The parents of the Michigan toddler accidentally served alcohol at an Applebee's restaurant last week have filed suit against the chain's parent company, saying its employees have made similar mistakes with other children.

Taylor Dill-Reese and Dominic Wilson, the parents of 15-month-old Dominic Lacey Wilson, filed the lawsuit late Tuesday in Oakland County, where the restaurant is located.

The suit claims the two suffered emotional distress as a result of the incident and seeks unspecified monetary damages from the company for medical bills and non-economic losses.

Last Friday, the family visited an Applebee's in Madison Heights, Michigan, where — among other things — they ordered a child's meal for Dominic Jr. that was supposed to come with apple juice.

What the little boy apparently got instead was a margarita mix with alcohol in it and as he drank it he began exhibiting what the complaint characterizes as "grossly inappropriate" behavior.

When the child was taken to a nearby hospital, he was found to have a blood alcohol content of 0.10 — above Michigan's drunken-driving limit of 0.08. He also suffered "headaches, nausea" and other classic hangover symptoms "for a period of days after the incident," according to the suit.

William Stern, the couple's attorney, told Reuters this was not the first mixup involving alcohol and children at an Applebee's restaurant.

"It's happened to them on multiple occasions," Stern said. "This is an occasion that came really close to being tragic if the child had ingested a little more alcohol. Fortunately they caught it, when the child was acting drunk and the father tasted it and realized it wasn't apple juice."

In a statement, Applebee's parent, California-based DineEquity Inc, cited what it said were "discrepancies" between some of the claims in the lawsuit and information the company had obtained.

It said that, according to the Madison Heights Police Department's report, a field test of the child's drink at the restaurant had registered a 0.014.

"This contrasts with what's been widely reported and claimed in the lawsuit — that the child had a blood alcohol content of .10 and was rushed to the hospital. According to the police report, the EMTs checked the child at the restaurant and released him.

"Applebee's is cooperating fully with the authorities so that we can better understand the discrepancies in the reports and the conflicting information."

Earlier this week, Applebee's said it would begin to serve apple juice to children only from single-serve containers at the table and would "retrain all severs on our beverage pouring policy, emphasizing that non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages must be stored in completely separate and identified containers."

[candymosh]

Lots of that going on this week


Toddler mistakenly served sangria at Lakeland Olive Garden

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By Howard Altman
Tampa Bay Online
updated 1 hour 18 minutes ago

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The company that owns the Olive Garden restaurant chain has apologized and changed its policy on the way some drinks are served after a 2-year-old Lakeland boy was accidentally served sangria.

Nikolai van Heest had nearly finished the drink in the green plastic Olive Garden cup, said his mother, when a waiter came over with a panicked look on his face.

She had ordered orange juice for her son, but the waiter told her the cup contained tropical sangria, said the boy's mother, Jill van Heest. Sangria contains wine and fruit juices.

Moments later, a manager came over and apologized. Van Heest said no one offered to call an ambulance so she and her mother rushed the boy to Lakeland Regional Medical Center, where she says he was treated for alcohol poisoning.

The incident occurred March 31. When she hadn't heard from managers at The Olive Garden restaurant on North Florida Avenue in Lakeland, she contacted an attorney, who reached out to the media.

On Wednesday, nearly two weeks later, Darden Restaurants, the Orlando-based company that owns Olive Garden, apologized for the incident and changed its policy on the way drinks are served.

"This was an extremely regrettable accident caused by the failure of an employee to follow our strict operating procedures," the company said in a statement. "We take this situation very seriously, and we are especially grateful that the child involved was not seriously harmed. We have absolutely no tolerance for failure to follow our operating procedures and we took swift, appropriate action to deal with this situation. Further, to prevent this situation from happening again, we will no longer prepare containers of Sangria in advance. It will be prepared from scratch when ordered, as is the case with all other alcoholic beverages."

This was the second recent incident of a restaurant chain serving a child alcohol. An Applebees Restaurant in Michigan also accidently served a child a drink containing alcohol.

In an interview Tuesday afternoon, van Heest said she had not decided what action, if any, to take. After watching her child "drunk" in the hospital – "he took one of the plastic chairs at the hospital and started riding it around like a horse," -- and seeing him suffer while nurses attempted to insert IVs, van Heest said she doesn't want to see any other parent go through the same thing.

"How disorganized does a bar need to be to serve children alcohol?" van Heest asked.

[Faline]

[dragonhalf13570]

Wow, that's soo strange for this to happen, and how it has occurred more than once in other places too. You would think that the people who made the order could smell the alcohol. I mean I'm not 21 and I don't drink, but I've smelled Margarita mixed wit alcohol and its certainly has an distinguishing smell to it especially comparing it to apple juice. I can't see how they can mistaken that.

[candymosh]

They need to have a clearly defined divide at the drink station. Shame it takes a lot of drunk tots to get them to look at their policies and retrain their staff.

[Picman]

Good that the Kids not try to Drive.This would give them a Fine for Drunk Driving....

[TheCapn]

What? If i order my kid a drink, i taste some anyway.
Its your freaking kid for christs sake, an adult or older child is able to say "This doesnt taste right", but a child doesnt have that ability.
Sure the companies are in the wrong..but these parents should be a little more alert.

[ChockFullOfChock]

Originally Posted by TheCapn ↗

What? If i order my kid a drink, i taste some anyway.
Its your freaking kid for christs sake, an adult or older child is able to say "This doesnt taste right", but a child doesnt have that ability.
Sure the companies are in the wrong..but these parents should be a little more alert.

In my experience younger kids don't like the taste of alcohol, and wont drink it.

It's not like you can slip your kid a vegetable without him knowing.

[JUANCELAYA]

come to mexico here 6 year olds or even younger can buy cigs or booze ve seen it maybe not for them bu their parentes or somebody send them to my store, lol

[Brometheus]

^ fuck use a better translator or atleast spellfucking check.. shit..