Texas Woman Says Starbucks Accidentally Poisoned Her Mocha

Is yet another lawsuit on the horizon for Starbucks? A Texas woman says the coffee giant served her a poisoned venti mocha earlier this week, in a story that sounds all too familiar.

According to Fox 7, Kelly Burns and her mother hit up the drive-thru at a San Marcos Starbucks on Tuesday morning. Burns says she made it about halfway through her drink when she “started having stomach issues”; she says she then dumped her drink out into the sink to find “there was two little wafers in there of something.”

Burns says she took her discovery back to the Starbucks, where the manager was apologetic and explained that the tablets were used to clean the espresso machines. She says she went to the emergency room where doctors called poison control and said she’d be “back to normal” in a few days.

Starbucks has been sued over similar incidents at least twice: Last July a Utah woman sued the chain for $2 million after she says she was served coffee tainted with industrial-strength cleaner, and a few months later a Seattle woman filed a lawsuit after drinking hot chocolate that allegedly had cleaning tablets in it. Both say they suffered serious injuries to their mouth, throat, and/or digestive tract.

Reached for comment, a Starbucks spokesperson says, “We are concerned to have learned about this situation. We are working with the customer directly as well as the partners (employees) in our store to understand what may have happened and to review the store’s cleaning protocol.” Meanwhile, Burns tells Fox 7 the company has offered to pay for her medical bills.

• Suing Starbucks Is America’s Favorite Pastime [E]
• Cleaning Tablets Found in Woman’s Starbucks Coffee [Fox 7]
• All Starbucks Coverage [E]