📎 Source Note: Transparency is essential in journalism. The facts and figures presented in this article are derived directly from the legal filings in this case. A copy of which can be found at the bottom of this article. We encourage readers to review the primary source document for themselves.

Corporate Misconduct Case Study: The Daily Harvest Crumbles and a System That Poisons for Profit

TL;DR: A “healthy” food product, Daily Harvest’s French Lentil + Leek Crumbles, caused severe gastrointestinal illness and even gallbladder removals in hundreds of consumers. A lawsuit reveals a complex international supply chain where a suspect ingredient, tara flour, passed from a Peruvian producer to an American importer and manufacturer, ending up on dinner plates across the country. A $7M settlement with the ingredient suppliers barely scratches the surface of a system that prioritizes profit over public health.

We invite you to read on to see how this happened and what it means for the rest of society.

Introduction: The Promise of Health, The Price of Convenience

Imagine ordering a healthy, plant-based meal, trusting the brand to deliver on its promise of clean, wholesome food. Now imagine that meal leads not to wellness, but to debilitating abdominal pain, fever, chills, and a trip to the hospital that ends with the surgical removal of your gallbladder. This isn’t a hypothetical horror story… it’s the experience alleged by Breeanne Buckley Peni and hundreds of other Americans who consumed Daily Harvest’s French Lentil + Leek Crumbles.

This case a dire indictment of a globalized food system operating under the logic of neoliberal capitalism. It peels back the label on a complex, international supply chain where accountability is diffused, oversight is dangerously weak, and the relentless pursuit of profit allegedly left a trail of sickened consumers.

The story of the Crumbles reveals how the system isn’t just broken—it is working as designed, externalizing the true costs of doing business onto the bodies of ordinary people.

Inside the Allegations: A Supply Chain of Harm

The legal battle exposes a fatal breakdown across a multi-layered supply chain. At the top sits Daily Harvest, the direct-to-consumer brand that sold the French Lentil + Leek Crumbles. They relied on a manufacturer, Stone Gate Foods, to produce the final product.

The problem, according to the lawsuit, originated with a single ingredient: tara flour. This flour was sourced from a company in Peru, Molinos Asociados, and imported into the United States by a supplier named Smirk’s Ltd. The lawsuit alleges that this tara flour was dangerously defective and unfit for human consumption, and that these companies failed to exercise reasonable care in its testing, importation, and distribution before it was mixed into a food product sold nationwide.

The human toll was devastating. Hundreds of people reported severe personal injuries after eating the Crumbles. The litigation grew to include at least 84 active lawsuits filed in New York alone, with 449 individuals represented by counsel in the settlement agreement. The harm was so widespread that the court system entered a Coordination Order to manage the sheer volume of cases, all seeking damages for injuries allegedly caused by the same product.

A settlement was reached with the ingredient suppliers, Smirk’s and Molinos, for $7.671 million. Critically, legal documents reveal this amount represents the remainder of Smirk’s insurance coverage, a financial cap that speaks volumes about how corporate liability is measured not by the scale of human suffering, but by the limits of an insurance policy.

A Timeline of Corporate Failure

Date	Event
June 27, 2022	A class action complaint is filed against Daily Harvest, Inc. on behalf of consumers who suffered gastrointestinal illness after consuming the French Lentil + Leek Crumbles.
August 17, 2022	The complaint is amended to also name the manufacturer, Stone Gate Foods, as a defendant.
November 10, 2022	The court grants Daily Harvest’s motion to compel arbitration, a common corporate tactic to move disputes out of public courtrooms, though it was never enacted due to settlement talks.
November 13, 2023	The parties participate in a full-day mediation session, where Daily Harvest and Stone Gate Foods agree in principle to settle claims against them.
May 22, 2024	The court grants preliminary approval of a class action settlement with defendants Daily Harvest and Stone Gate.
October 8, 2024	A memorandum is filed seeking preliminary approval for a separate $7.671 million settlement with the ingredient suppliers, Smirk’s Ltd. and Molinos Asociados.

Regulatory Capture & Legal Loopholes: A System Designed to Fail

The Daily Harvest case is a textbook example of how deregulation and a fragmented global supply chain create the perfect conditions for disaster. Under the principles of neoliberalism, corporations are encouraged to self-regulate, and government oversight is deliberately weakened. This creates a system where an ingredient can travel thousands of miles from a foreign producer like Molinos in Peru, through an importer like Smirk’s, to a manufacturer and distributor, with each step creating a potential gap in accountability.

The lawsuit claims that the companies failed in their fundamental duty to ensure the safety of their product, a failure to exercise “reasonable care.” This is the predictable outcome of a system that relies on corporate actors to police themselves when their primary legal and financial obligation is to maximize profit. When every entity in the chain assumes the others are conducting proper safety checks, the result is that no one may be doing so adequately.

The legal claims include violations of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, the foundational law governing food safety in America.

The fact that a product causing such widespread harm could so easily enter the national market demonstrates the glaring loopholes in our regulatory framework. This is not just an oversight; it is the logical result of decades of policy that prioritizes the speed and low cost of commerce over the methodical, expensive work of public protection.

Profit-Maximization at All Costs: The True Corporate Ethic

In a capitalist economy, the ultimate goal is profit, and every business decision is weighed against its impact on the bottom line. The introduction of novel ingredients like tara flour is often a marketing strategy to appeal to health-conscious consumers seeking the next “superfood.” However, the race to innovate and capture market share can incentivize cutting corners on safety, especially when sourcing from international suppliers where oversight may be less stringent.

The financial details of the settlement are revealing. The $7.671 million offered by Smirk’s and Molinos is not a figure based on the pain and suffering of hundreds of victims; it is based on the remaining limits of an insurance policy. Furthermore, one of the defendants, the Peruvian producer Molinos, is reportedly uninsured, contributing only $25,000 toward the cost of notifying class members.

This reflects a business model where risk is not eliminated but externalized. The potential for catastrophic public harm becomes a calculated risk, offset by limited insurance coverage or, in some cases, no coverage at all. The cost of injury—medical bills, lost wages, chronic health issues—is transferred from the corporation’s balance sheet to the individual consumer and the public healthcare system.

The Economic Fallout: Shifting the Burden to the Victim

The true economic fallout of this alleged corporate negligence is not measured in settlement figures, but in the lives of the victims. The lawsuit seeks to recover damages for “personal injuries” and “consequential monetary damages,” a sterile legal term for the financial ruin that can accompany a medical crisis. For hundreds of families, this meant unexpected and astronomical hospital bills, lost income from being unable to work, and the long-term costs of managing chronic conditions.

This is the hidden subsidy of neoliberal capitalism. When a company sells a product that makes people sick, the profits are privatized, but the costs are socialized. The victims, their families, and public and private insurers bear the financial brunt of the fallout. The settlement fund, while significant, represents a fraction of the total economic harm and does little to address the systemic incentives that created the problem in the first place.

The legal process itself is an economic burden. While a class action provides a vehicle for collective redress, it comes only after extensive and expensive litigation. The system forces victims to fight for years to recover costs that they never should have incurred, further underscoring how the economic deck is stacked in favor of corporations.

Public Health Risks: A Mass Poisoning Event

At its core, the Daily Harvest Crumbles case is about a massive public health failure. A product marketed as a pillar of a healthy lifestyle became, for hundreds of people, a source of intense physical suffering. The plaintiffs’ claims are not minor or frivolous; they involve severe gastrointestinal illnesses requiring hospitalization and, in the most extreme cases, the surgical removal of an organ.

This was not a series of isolated incidents. It was a mass event, with a single, uniform product allegedly causing similar injuries across the country. The common thread was the tara flour, an ingredient that was supposed to be safe but is alleged to have been adulterated and dangerous.

The incident serves as a chilling reminder of the vulnerability of our food supply. In a system where ingredients are sourced globally and assembled domestically, a single point of failure can trigger a nationwide health crisis. This is the public health risk we accept when we allow corporate profit motives to outweigh robust, state-enforced safety standards.

Exploitation of Workers: The Unseen Cost

While the legal documents in this consumer lawsuit do not detail the conditions of the workers who harvested, processed, and shipped the tara flour, it is a critical part of the story of neoliberal capitalism. The same systemic pressures that lead to cutting corners on consumer safety often rely on the exploitation of labor. From agricultural workers in Peru to factory employees in the United States, the drive to lower costs and maximize efficiency frequently translates to low wages, precarious employment, and unsafe working conditions.

In a globalized supply chain, labor rights are often the first casualty in the relentless pursuit of a lower price point. While we cannot say for certain what happened within Molinos, Smirk’s, or Stone Gate, we must recognize that consumer safety and worker safety are two sides of the same coin. A system that devalues one will almost inevitably devalue the other, treating both human health and human labor as disposable inputs in the engine of profit.

Community Impact: The Betrayal of Trust

The harm in this case extends beyond individual medical diagnoses; it inflicted a deep wound on the community of trust that underpins our entire food system. Consumers, particularly those who invest in brands like Daily Harvest, operate on a fundamental faith that the food they buy is safe and that companies are bound by a duty of care. The widespread illnesses allegedly caused by the French Lentil + Leek Crumbles shattered that faith for hundreds of people.

This betrayal erodes the social contract between producer and consumer. It fosters a climate of suspicion and anxiety, forcing individuals to become hyper-vigilant investigators of ingredient lists and supply chain origins—a burden that should be carried by corporations and regulators. The “community” damaged here is the national community of consumers who now have another reason to question whether the promise of health and convenience is merely a marketing veneer for unacceptable risks.

The PR Machine: Managing the Narrative

While the legal filings do not offer a glimpse into Daily Harvest’s public relations strategy, they do reveal a key corporate tactic for controlling the narrative: forcing legal disputes out of the public eye. On July 27, 2022, Daily Harvest moved to compel arbitration, citing its customer agreement. The court granted this motion, a decision that could have moved the case from a public courtroom into a private, confidential process.

This is a classic maneuver in the corporate playbook. Arbitration shields companies from the public scrutiny, jury verdicts, and legal precedents that come with open court proceedings. While the parties ultimately pursued a global settlement instead of proceeding with arbitration, the initial move speaks volumes. It reflects a strategy aimed not just at limiting legal liability, but at managing information and preventing the full, unvarnished story of consumer harm from becoming a matter of public record.

Wealth Disparity & Corporate Greed

The settlement in this case is an enlightening illustration of wealth disparity in action. On one side, you have hundreds of ordinary individuals who suffered severe, life-altering health consequences, including hospitalization and the removal of an organ.

Their costs are measured in chronic pain, medical debt, and lost quality of life. On the other side, you have corporations resolving these hundreds of claims with a payment that, for the main supplier, is simply the remainder of its insurance policy.

This is the very definition of corporate greed: a system where companies can allegedly cause widespread harm, yet their financial exposure is capped and calculated. The proposed settlement of $7.671 million, while a large number, is dwarfed by the collective human cost. It treats catastrophic health failures as a predictable business expense, a line item to be managed by insurers and lawyers. This financial logic protects accumulated corporate wealth while leaving individuals to shoulder the devastating and unquantifiable personal losses.

Global Parallels: A Pattern of Predation

While the lawsuit notes that the litigation over tara flour is the “first of its kind”, the underlying pattern is tragically familiar. Mass food and waterborne illness outbreaks are a recurring feature of our industrialized food system. Courts have seen numerous class action lawsuits certified on behalf of hundreds or even thousands of people who suffered personal injuries from a single contaminated source.

Cases have been certified for norovirus outbreaks and cryptosporidium outbreaks, sickening thousands of people at a time. The Daily Harvest saga is yet another chapter in a long and sordid story of food safety failures. It demonstrates that whether the contaminant is a common bacteria or a novel ingredient like tara flour, the systemic vulnerabilities remain the same: a lack of oversight, a diffusion of responsibility, and a system that reacts with lawsuits and settlements only after the damage is done.

Corporate Accountability Fails the Public

The proposed settlement, hailed in legal documents as “fair, reasonable, and adequate”, represents a failure of genuine corporate accountability. A settlement allows a company to end litigation without ever admitting wrongdoing.

There is no trial, no public verdict from a jury of peers, and no official finding of liability. The process is designed to provide “certainty and finality” for the class members who participate, but it also provides closure for the defendants, who can resolve the issue with a check and move on.

Furthermore, the settlement fund itself is subject to deductions. Beyond the costs of administration, the insurer for Smirk’s is holding back over $753,000 for other, unrelated claims. The company also has the right to hold back an additional amount from the settlement fund if a significant number of class members opt out to pursue their own cases. This means the final amount available to victims is not guaranteed. This form of accountability is procedural and financial, not moral or punitive. It is the cost of doing business, not a penalty that forces a fundamental change in behavior.

Pathways for Reform & Consumer Advocacy

This case is a clear call for systemic reform. If we are to prevent the next food safety disaster, we cannot rely on post-harm lawsuits. We need proactive, preventative policies, including:

Strengthened FDA Oversight: The Food and Drug Administration must have more resources and a stronger mandate to inspect and test ingredients imported from overseas, especially novel ingredients being introduced into the food supply.
Mandatory Supplier Liability: Foreign and domestic suppliers must be held strictly liable for the safety of their ingredients. This should include requirements for carrying sufficient insurance to cover potential harm, preventing a situation where a key supplier in the chain is uninsured.
Closing Legal Loopholes: Lawmakers must curtail the use of mandatory arbitration clauses in consumer contracts for essential goods like food. Public health issues should be litigated in public courts, not behind the closed doors of private arbitration.
Empowering Collective Action: The ability of consumers to band together in class action lawsuits is a crucial, if imperfect, check on corporate power. These rights must be protected and strengthened to ensure that individuals have a viable path to justice when faced with widespread harm.

Conclusion: The System Worked as Intended

The Daily Harvest French Lentil + Leek Crumbles disaster was not an accident. It was the predictable result of a food system designed to prioritize profit, speed, and innovation over public health and safety. From the fields of Peru to the kitchens of America, a chain of corporate actors operated within a framework that incentivized risk and offloaded the consequences onto an unsuspecting public. The hundreds of people who fell ill were victims of a capitalistic system that is functioning exactly as it was designed to under the logic of neoliberal capitalism.

The subsequent legal battle and settlement, while providing some measure of financial relief, also showcase the system’s deep inadequacies. Accountability was reduced to a financial transaction, capped by an insurance policy, and managed through a multi-year legal process that further burdened the victims. This case is a warning: unless we fundamentally reform the rules that govern our food supply and demand real accountability from corporations, it is only a matter of time before the next “healthy” product leaves a new trail of devastation.

Frivolous or Serious Lawsuit?

This lawsuit is unequivocally serious. Any claim to the contrary is dismantled by the sheer weight of the evidence presented in the court filings. The case involves hundreds of victims across the United States who suffered similar, severe personal injuries after consuming a single product. The harm here includes debilitating gastrointestinal illness and the surgical removal of claimants’ gallbladders.

The gravity of the situation is further underscored by the court’s own actions, such as consolidating dozens of individual lawsuits to manage the litigation efficiently. Finally, the willingness of multiple corporate defendants to agree to multi-million dollar settlements confirms the significant legal and financial risk they faced.

A court only grants preliminary approval to a settlement after finding “probable cause” that the deal is fair, a step that weeds out frivolous claims. And even ignoring all of that, Daily Harvest literally did a recall on their own stupid food product…. which is enough of an indictment by itself imo

peni-v-daily-harvest-inc-et-al-memo Download

The FDA has a page on this recall: https://www.fda.gov/food/outbreaks-foodborne-illness/investigation-adverse-event-reports-french-lentil-leek-crumbles-june-2022

The FDA page also had a link to an archive of the recall notice: https://web.archive.org/web/20250308094455/https://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts/daily-harvest-issues-voluntary-recall-french-lentil-leek-crumbles-due-potential-health-risk

💡 Explore Corporate Misconduct by Category

Corporations harm people every day — from wage theft to pollution. Learn more by exploring key areas of injustice.

💀 Product Safety Violations — When companies risk lives for profit.
🌿 Environmental Violations — Pollution, ecological collapse, and unchecked greed.
💼 Labor Exploitation — Wage theft, worker abuse, and unsafe conditions.
🛡️ Data Breaches & Privacy Abuses — Misuse and mishandling of personal information.
💵 Financial Fraud & Corruption — Lies, scams, and executive impunity.

NOTE:

This website is facing massive amounts of headwind trying to procure the lawsuits relating to corporate misconduct. We are being pimp-slapped by a quadruple whammy:

The Trump regime's reversal of the laws & regulations meant to protect us is making it so victims are no longer filing lawsuits for shit which was previously illegal.
Donald Trump's defunding of regulatory agencies led to the frequency of enforcement actions severely decreasing. What's more, the quality of the enforcement actions has also plummeted.
The GOP's insistence on cutting the healthcare funding for millions of Americans in order to give their billionaire donors additional tax cuts has recently shut the government down. This government shut down has also impacted the aforementioned defunded agencies capabilities to crack down on evil-doers. Donald Trump has since threatened to make these agency shutdowns permanent on account of them being "democrat agencies".
My access to the LexisNexis legal research platform got revoked. This isn't related to Trump or anything, but it still hurt as I'm being forced to scrounge around public sources to find legal documents now. Sadge.

All four of these factors are severely limiting my ability to access stories of corporate misconduct.

Due to this, I have temporarily decreased the amount of articles published everyday from 5 down to 3, and I will also be publishing articles from previous years as I was fortunate enough to download a butt load of EPA documents back in 2022 and 2023 to make YouTube videos with.... This also means that you'll be seeing many more environmental violation stories going forward :3

Thank you for your attention to this matter,

Aleeia (owner and publisher of www.evilcorporations.com)

Also, can we talk about how ICE has a $170 billion annual budget, while the EPA-- which protects the air we breathe and water we drink-- barely clocks $4 billion? Just something to think about....