One of the most popular scam lawsuits of the last few decades is the ol' "look what disgusting biomatter I found in my food/drink/Arby's." We've all heard of someone finding a cyst in their McChicken, a worm in their salad, Snooki resin on their fries, whatever. Rarely, however, do you hear how these cases play out beyond the few that are exposed as fraud right off the bat, like that lady with the finger in her chili. 'Member her? Who keeps a finger handy to slip into chili? Crazy broad.
Arguably a good defense to any of these kinds of cases would be to say that the accuser is a liar, possibly with pants all aflame. Pepsi decided that argument wasn't succinct enough when a man sued them, claiming he'd found a mouse carcass adrift in his can of Mountain Dew. Their defense was that, from the time the can was sealed to when the man opened it, 15 months had past. And a mouse carcass would have dissolved all to a sludgy, gelatinous goo-like mucous plug at the bottom of the can in that amount of time.
Experts who have studied the effect of citric acid on bones and teeth agree that, yes indeed, a whole mouse submerged for that long probably would have mostly dissolved, but the collagen would have definitely stayed around to ensure that you'd get a big, thick mouthful of terror. It just wouldn't look like a mouse.
A veterinarian testified that the mouse wasn't even born at the time the can was filled and had clearly died, in the air, before someone put it in the can, meaning the lawsuit was a fraud and the jelly-mouse defense wasn't entirely necessary. Interestingly, some experts also claim that a single can of Mountain Dew probably could not jelly a mouse because the amount of acid in a small can isn't enough -- it would need to be in a vat of the stuff for that to happen -- meaning Pepsi made up a worse lie to cover its own ass than the truth of what happened, because derp.
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