Panera hit with another wrongful death suit over caffeinated lemonade

By Danielle Wiener-Bronner, CNN

New York (CNN) — Panera is being sued again after another customer is said to have died after consuming the chain’s caffeinated lemonade.

Dennis Brown was a 46-year-old man with a chromosomal deficiency disorder, ADHD and high blood pressure who avoided energy drinks, according to a wrongful death complaint filed this week by his mother, brother and sister. A loyal Panera customer, he started regularly ordering “charged lemonade” in late September, according to the suit.

On October 9, Brown, who had a mild intellectual disability and blurry vision along with developmental delay but lived independently, ordered a charged lemonade and is believed to have refilled his cup twice over the course of about an hour and a half, the suit said. He suffered a cardiac event on his walk home and was pronounced dead at the scene when found unresponsive.

The complaint resembles another wrongful death suit filed earlier this year by the parents of Sarah Katz, a 21-year-old woman who died in September 2022 after drinking Panera’s charged lemonade. Katz was diagnosed with a heart condition called long QT syndrome when she was five years old, and managed symptoms by taking medication and limiting caffeine, according to that lawsuit.

In a statement on the latest lawsuit, Panera said it “expresses our deep sympathy for Mr. Brown’s family,” adding that “based on our investigation, we believe his unfortunate passing was not caused by one of the company’s products.”

Panera added that “we view this lawsuit, which was filed by the same law firm as a previous claim, to be equally without merit. Panera stands firmly by the safety of our products.” Lawyers from the firm Kline & Specter represent both families.

Brown’s lawyers argue that the beverage should have been marketed as an energy drink in stores, based on the amount of caffeine and sugar per serving. But the self-serve beverage was not labeled as such and was sold alongside non- or less-caffeinated drinks, according to the suit.

“Panera Charged Lemonade is a juice beverage marketed to children and adults alike,” the suit claims.

“This marketing is especially dangerous to a vulnerable population, children and adults who would reasonably believe this product was lemonade and safe for consumption,” according to the complaint, which added that the beverage is also dangerous because it is mixed on the premises by employees, so its caffeine content is not strictly controlled.

Katz, who died last year, may have believed the caffeinated drink was regular lemonade, her parents alleged in the suit they filed against Panera.

Katz experienced cardiac arrest and died after being transported to a hospital and suffering a second arrest, according to the earlier lawsuit. “We will work quickly to thoroughly investigate this matter,” Panera said in a statement at the time. The case remains open.

Panera declined on Tuesday to comment on whether it has changed the makeup of its drink, but it does appear to have decreased the amount of caffeine per serving.

According to Panera’s website, charged beverages have between 150 and 158 milligrams of caffeine per 20-ounce serving, less than a 20-ounce cup of Panera’s dark roast coffee, which has about 268 milligrams of caffeine. An online description of the caffeinated lemonade advises customers to “use in moderation” and notes that it is “NOT RECOMMENDED FOR children, people sensitive to caffeine, pregnant or nursing women.”

The most recent lawsuit, however, said that there were about 260 milligrams of caffeine in a 20-ounce serving of charged lemonade. CNN reported in October that a large size, which comes in a 30-oz cup, contained about 390 mg of caffeine, the same caffeine-per-ounce ratio. At the time, Panera’s website compared the charged lemonade to its dark roast coffee in terms of caffeine content. Now, a 30-ounce charged Panera drink has no more than 237 milligrams of caffeine, according to Panera’s site.

According to the US Food and Drug Administration, “healthy adults” should be able to safely consume about 400 milligrams of caffeine each day.

— CNN’s Eva Rothenberg contributed to this report.

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