condolences regardless. Such an avoidable yet horrible way to pass away

Did you already forget the tomato ban because of the salmonella scare? Maybe the guy thought the asparagus was substituted because they were unable to put tomatoes on it.

I've gotten dishes where the sides were different because they were out of the original item several times. IT HAPPENS.

@arsbadmojo: Why would he know until he's actually eaten crab meat?

"Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die." --Mel Brooks

Before anyone blames the kitchen, waitstaff, or restaurant note that nowhere in the article does it say the customer told anyone that he was allergic to crab meat. It says he ordered the chicken because he was allergic to crab but not that he told the waiter about the specific allergy or its severity. It may have been friends or family that later revealed his reasons for ordering the chicken.

I agree with others. Restaurants need to keep a few epi-pens on hand and individuals with known allergies need to carry one too AND have an alert bracelet or tag. @BoomerFive - NO it is NOT assine to suggest that someone with severe allergies restrict the places they visit. It is common sense.

Condolences to this man. He probably didn't realize the severity of his allergy. I've had some extremely frightening experiences (yes, a couple) and thank goodness for the epinepherine.

When I found out I had a food allergy I got epi-pens that week. No fooling around with this type of thing. They're not a perfect solution, but maybe it will help you survive until you can get to the hospital.

I am kind of angry that there are no charges being filed. We don't know if the poor guy made it clear that he had an allergy, but restaurants are so used to people who don't "like" a food calling it an "allergy" that it's probably a Boy-Who-Called-Wolf problem now. Maybe this will remind them that SOME people DO have allergies.

I don't think it's too unreasonable for restaurants to keep one around especially since, as satoru pointed out, someone other than the person going into shock will probably have to be the one to use it.

The person who brought out the food was probably just a runner, not their waiter or the chef. It's entirely likely that they feel wretched about what happened.

The server, the chef, the manager, heck even nearby patrons who could have tried to save his life but failed, probably all feel responsible and I'd wager most of them feel terrible about it.

I don't care how much you personally hate wait staff, assuming that they're unfeeling like this is assuming they're inhuman. Maybe some people wouldn't care, but I think the majority of the population would, even if it wasn't their fault.

Reading the comments here made me sad. I have a anaphylactic peanut allergy, and I am extremely careful about what and where I eat. I always carry an epi pen with me, and I always explain my allergy to the waiter and ask how things are cooked--what kind of oil is used, if anything with peanuts is cooked in the same pan/on the grill. I always look at menus before I decide to eat at a restaurant. This means avoiding most asian restaurants, even though I love the food. I know the word for peanut in several languages. I know what dishes often have "hidden" peanuts (e.g. navratan korma, mole sauce). Even though I'm not allergic to tree nuts, I avoid them too. I read labels obsessively. All of my family/friends/coworkers know what to do if I go into anaphylactic shock. Somehow, though, I get the sense that most people here would blame me if a restaurant served me something with nuts in it, since I shouldn't have left the house in the first place.

To everyone who has a food "dislike" that they claim is an allergy: please stop. I know it gets you your cilantro-free salsa 30 seconds faster, but it makes life worse for those of us who do have life-threatening allergies. If a waiter picks the jalepenos off your quesadilla and sees you digging in with no ill consequences, it makes them think that allergies aren't to be taken seriously. You know what would happen if someone picked the peanuts off a dish that they then served to me? Death.

Please, have compassion for people whose lives might be more difficult than your own.

Given what data is in the story, I guess I'd have to assign blame at 70% Ruby Tuesday, 30% Customer.

That of course could change if the customer didn't know they were deathly allergic to shellfish - just hard to see how you could get to that age and not know.

Condolences to the family and friends.

I think it would be pretty hard to be that allergic to seafood and not know about it. You can spontaneously develop allergies, but not usually to the extent where it would be fatal.

Honestly, I'm amazed this sort of thing doesn't happen more often. I have a friend with a severe gluten allergy (trace amounts can cause him massive discomfort for an entire day), and we eat out on a semiregular basis. Even when he stresses to the waitstaff that he has a severe allergy and ALL CONTACT must be avoided, chances are about 50-50 they'll screw it up (mostly not telling the prep staff to change their damn gloves or wash their hands).

@stuckonsmart: "One doesn't trust one's health to minimum-wage personnel"? Doesn't one?

I'm pretty sure you do, every day. Even if you don't have a food allergy, you are trusting that the minimum-wage workers who prepared your food didn't make a mistake that contaminated your meal or otherwise made it unsafe. If you want to talk about a severely underpaid class of workers, low level hospital and clinic staff don't make much, particularly for the hours/duties, and they're very connected to your health. Ever gotten your car serviced at Wal-Mart? Or bought wiring on the recommendation of a Home Depot clerk?

Or is one so elevated above humanity that one need never allow minimum-wage workers to sully one's existence, or in fact rely upon any other human beings at all?

@backbroken: If you were in that guy's place, I seriously doubt you'd never, ever want to eat out with friends once in your whole life. Every single time somebody was celebrating a birthday or getting old friends together, you'd say, "Sorry, I'm going to sit here at home and eat white bread and have nothing to do with you guys, because I'm allergic to ONE kind of food among many?" If this is true, that's actually really sad. But I doubt it's true.

It's a tragic mistake. I can see that even if the guy did know he was allergic, he might not have told the server about a shellfish allergy when he was ordering a chicken meal. It's also possible that the guy did not know about his allergy or that the allergy had become much more severe recently. (I have heard that some people will go through periods of having only mild reactions to shellfish and then, suddenly, WHAM.) And if it's an evening meal, the lights are low, everyone is sort of distracted, etc., I can see not noticing the crabmeat until a moment too late.

It's just tragic, basically.

We've found the only way to have a new dish prepared is to feign an allergy or make a stink. Which direction I go depends on the mood I'm in and how the server is reacting to the request.

It's very sad, but charging the wait staff or the chef could open up a whole legal can 'o worms that i'm sure a lot of judges would not like to be involved in. That being said, if the cust told them that he was allergic, and they did this, that's one thing. if they didn't know and it was an honest mistake, that's completely different because it would show no intent/knowledge that the food would in fact be a danger and their actions would harm the customer. In that case the cust not informing them would legally be considered acceptable risk on his part.

problem is we don't know the whole story.

@brainologist: Epi-Pens are made available only by prescription. Not sure if it's something that you can have just lying around. Also since it would expire someone needs to keep an eye on it to make sure it is still viable and everyone is trained on how to administer. At least with an AED you really only have to worry about the battery, which lasts a fairly long time.

@kylenalepa: You'd be surprised. Speaking as a celiac, I went to Pei Wei, requested their special gluten free menu, ordered the spring rolls off that same menu, stressed that I was allergic to gluten so please do not bring out the soy sauce it comes with and made sure I was in ear shot of the cooks as well.

What do you think came out with my spring rolls? Yep, the sauce, and two cups of it too. On the menu it specifically states "With no soy sauce" I specifically stated, NO SOY SAUCE. I got soy sauce. Was there soy sauce in the wraps too? Who knows? I sure didn't try and find out.

They don't give a damn, plain and simple.

@bobbleheadr: true I didn't think of that.
Tied in with health inspections checking for expired first-aid kit contents and a law to protect good samaritans / businesses from civil suit for trying to help and it would work.

I am allergic to penicillin. I do not carry an epi-pen, but I do wear a RoadID that indicates my allergy when I'm exercising and a wallet card when I'm not. I hope nobody ever has to read those items due to my inability to communicate, but it was worth the expense ($20 for the RoadID and $5/year for the card) for my peace of mind.

Also, I'm not sure how good an idea it is to keep epi-pens around as you would a defibrillator. I've known people that abuse epi-pens to get high. I suppose you could keep them locked up, but they do expire.

Nowadays -- it's ALWAYS someone else's fault, never my own. I'm with the posters who subscribe to the theory that one doesn't entrust one's health to minimum wage personnel.

Or how about the Boy Scout's motto -- BE PREPARED. I am sure in a prep kitchen -- trace ingredients are more inclined to be co-mingled in dishes than NOT.

My cautionary motto in life -- Prepare for the worst and hope for the best!

My first question about common sense . . . OOPS, forgot it's NOT so common.

The quick-sue culture thats been allowed to thrive has forced companies to stop offering basic medical service, since they suddenly add all sorts of extra liabilities.

I remember when Mac Grill stopped providing CPR training for employees, since they didnt want to be sued if 1) there wasnt someone trained on duty or 2) someone screwed up and cracked some ribs (a common thing).

1. He didn't know the severity of the allergy.

or

2. He didn't care enough or didn't think it was a big deal.

Obviously we'll never know one way or the other, but I'm inclined to believe that it was just an unfortunate accident and nobody is at fault.

I could make a joke about a dead rapper, but that would be in bad taste.

Does it look drastically different from chicken? Is it purple or something?

I'm thinking RT should change up the dish a little.

@BoomerFive: Don't complain here, e-mail Consumerist and tell them about the inappropriate comments.

Yes, there is a new moderator but that's still just one person.

I think all businesses and especially restaurants should be mandated to have stocked first aid kits with Epi-Pens available for public use! the cost to a business would be minuscule compared to the the good publicity of saving someone and the bad publicity of killing some one.

For those of you demanding murder (or manslaughter) charges I hope you never ever make a single mistake in life. This is a tragic mistake that, sadly, can happen in any restaurant. I'm not sure how a waiter bringing a dish to a customer (unless it was malicious) that caused a reaction could be found CRIMINALLY liable, and Im glad the local authorities agree.

The family can go ahead and sue, and will probably receive a hefty settlement, but it won't be the waiter they go after, since the "deep pockets" here belong to the restaurant.

I also still can't understand how you wouldn't notice crab meat sitting on top of your chicken, but I've never had Ruby Tuesday's Chicken Oscar before, so I have no idea how obvious it is to see.

I was just about to say something along the same lines. I have Celiac Disease (intolerance to gluten found in wheat, barley, rye, etc). I very rarely eat out because I know there's an extraordinarily good chance I will be sick for two weeks later. When I do choose to go out with friends, it's a risk I take, though I try to talk to the waiter/manager and do the best I can. I can't imagine taking that risk if I had a life-threatening allergy, but perhaps he didn't know.

This is a true tragedy for everyone involved. My deepest sympathy to the families.

If the restaurant had been informed of his allergy, then it would have been involuntary manslaughter to accidentally serve a dish that kills him. Probably on the part of either the waiter who took and served the order or the restaurant itself, and likely the latter.

Parents with peanut-allergic children practice safety through meticulous precaution, to the point of annoyance, and I'm sure many people with deadly allergies are warning restaurants before placing orders too. Even Hawkins may not have known about the allergy. It's just a terrible accident, and it's hurting everyone involved.

Chicken Fresco
A fresh, grilled chicken breast topped with seasonal vine-ripened tomatoes, lemon-butter sauce, and a splash of balsamic vinaigrette. Served with fresh, steamed broccoli and mashed potatoes.
Chicken Oscar
Tender jumbo lump crab meat with asparagus tips and lemon-butter sauce atop a fresh grilled chicken breast. Served with fresh, steamed broccoli and mashed potatoes.

Even if he did have an epipen with him, they are not always enough to stop a bad reaction or slow it down long enough to get help.

I have a wheat allergy and I can tell you from experience that wait staff don't give a rip and don't understand food allergies. I don't make a big deal out of it, but asking about ingredients of an item is pointless. If you asked 10 wait staff people if fried shrimp have wheat in them, 9 will tell you no.

This is a terrible accident. My heart goes out to the family & friends of the deceased. I'm also thinking some positive thoughts for the restaurant staff; you know they have to feel awful.

That said, I can't get behind requiring businesses to keep Epi-Pens on hand. You get into issues such as additional liability, where to keep the things, training staff in recognizing the need for one...seriously impractical.

There are many people who carry -Pens with them for just such occasions, as asthma patients carry (or should carry)inhalers. I'm not one to dictate personal behavior, but I see carrying such meds as fairly cheap life insurance.

@mrmysterious: I was a waitress for about a year. I always wrote everything down, not only for myself but for my customers' peace of mind- I can't be the only one who absolutely hates when waitstaff write nothing down. It's as though they're saying:

"What you want isn't all that important to me."

Furthermore, my best friend is severely lactose intolerant, and whenever we go out somewhere new, she asks if there is any cheese/milk/butter in the dish she has ordered and stresses that it's because she's severely allergic so that the waitstaff are sure to ask the kitchen and make sure her dish arrives without traces of milk. Just in case, though, she does always have a pill that will help calm her stomach and keep her from having a puking fit/breaking out into hives in the restaurant.

The story doesn't say whether or not the customer was aware of his allergy- maybe he didn't know. Regardless, he ordered one dish and was served another, which is the issue at hand.

You can sue a server right into bankruptcy but they probably don't have much money to begin with and I'm not sure what that will accomplish. Ultimately, you can't trust anyone but your own instincts with these things.

The best way to approach it from a consumer standpoint, assuming you know ahead of time about the severity of the allergy -- is to make the server clear that if it's not done right you risk death. It gets their attention. Plus, if they don't know about ingredients, it's unlikely that they'd be willing to risk that.

But suing them? I guess you could. But restaurants get busy and people forget orders. It happens. If someone were to serve you regular coffee by mistake does that make him liable for a lawsuit too? Lord knows the coffee got mixed up more than anything else. I usually just served people decaf either way because that's all that was handy.

Regardless, I would hope some sort of compensation would be offered and the family will be provided for in a way far beyond free meals at Ruby Tuesdays.

A fresh, grilled chicken breast topped with seasonal vine-ripened tomatoes, lemon-butter sauce, and a splash of balsamic vinaigrette. Served with fresh, steamed broccoli and mashed potatoes.

[www.rubytuesday.com]

Chicken Oscar

Tender jumbo lump crab meat with asparagus tips and lemon-butter sauce atop a fresh grilled chicken breast. Served with fresh, steamed broccoli and mashed potatoes.

[www.flickr.com]

I'm not trying to flame the victim here, it certainly is a tragedy. But if he knew he was allergic to shell fish wouldn't he have questioned the lump crab meat on the top of the chicken? I would like to think that maybe he didn't know. But then how do you get to the ripe old age of 35 and not know?

On the other hand, my son has a bad allergy to sesame seeds, which he was tested for after having a bad reaction, and we now carry an Epipen AND benadryl. You really need to have both since the Epipen gives you 15 minutes or so to get to a hospital. The benadryl will kick in during that 15 minutes.

Don't laugh, a certain youth organization I know of banned all peanut-containing products from a recent week-long day camp event. Worked like a charm, the one child of over 1,500 who had nut allergies was completely unaffected.

On one hand, I'd like to be bitchy about one kid's problem affecting that many other kids. On the other hand...I think about going through life without peanut butter, and I just can't imagine how much that would suck, so bitchiness seems rather petty.

While not a medical expert, the hospital more than likely gave him epi, then went to work trying to save him seeing a chance at survival. If it was so bad he was DOS, I don't think they would have flailed on him for so long. It sounds like it was severe, but not an instant death severe, and no one got there soon enough to halt the progression until the paramedics arrived.

Food allergies suck, my wife is allergic to tree nuts so we are constantly doing it. She is also bad about carrying her epi-pen with her.

Even if he got the correct order, cross contamination could occur. My mom is allergic to clams and she has to be careful to avoid anything fried at places that serve clams because the clams and everything else are all fried in the same oil and she ends up sick even if she doesn't eat the clams.

@NumberFiveIsAlive: People are held criminally responsible for human error all the time. This server shouldn't be exempt from that. Error or not, he or she still caused someone's death.

(As for how you confuse shellfish and chicken, I wondered about that too, but I suppose it depends on how it's prepped -- had a veggie friend accidentally eat chicken that was put on instead of tofu and the chicken looked and tasted just like the tofu, particularly when smothered in sauce, I couldn't tell the difference either -- and on how familiar he is with shellfish. I, personally, have no idea what shrimp or lobster tastes like and probably wouldn't know if confronted with it.)

I don't have food allergies, but if I did, one of the biggest assumptions I would make is never trust anyone with food items I didn't see made or made my self. Stick to the salad bar, don't go out to eat in strange places, etc..

@BoomerFive: Yes, you should be able to go to any restaurant you want to regardless of your food allergy. But the reality is that you can't, unless you are willing to play waiter roulette. Ruby Tuesday is at fault here, to what degree I can't tell from the story. But why take the risk? Of course, it was Mr. Hawkins right to take that chance. I'm just saying I probably would not.

How long until some restaurant posts a sign saying "People with food allergies eat at their own risk."

This poor guy probably knew he was allergic to shellfish because of a bad experience (maybe hives or mild anaphylaxis) as a child and avoided shellfish his entire life - only to experience a deadly reaction the one time he eats it 20 years later. No way to know.

I easily see a civil suit too against the restaurant even if no criminal charges go in. If the order went in right and came out of the kitchen wrong, also against the chef. If the order went in wrong, against the server.

In addition to the friends and family of Mr. Hawkins my sympathy goes out to the workers who would never mean to do this and who must be devastated.

@Ash78: My guess, if he knew he was allergic, he would have known not to eat it. He must have gotten it, and decided to eat it anyway. I'm not sure how you confuse shellfish with chicken. Just a guess.

@BoomerFive: You should be able to go out to eat and actually get what you order

In a perfect world, yes. But do you trust your local restaurant staff with the same level of care as a surgical team or air traffic controllers? I sure hope not.

@BoomerFive:

Yeah, so much for that new commenter code.

Either way, this man wouldn't have died if Ruby Tuesday had brought him the correct dish. This isn't the victim's fault.

@BoomerFive: ITA. Blaming the victim is the wrong way to go here. Its Ruby Tuesday's fault, end of story.

I'm in no way blaming the consumer, as this is terribly tragic. But I would never place my life in the hands of anonymous strangers working a mimimum wage job. If you have a severe food allergy I think you ought to just stay out of restaurants. It sucks, but those are the cards life has dealt you.

Honestly, I'm not sure why the guy ate the chicken. The Chicken Fresco that he ordered should have been topped with fresh tomatoes. Chicken Oscar is topped with crabmeat, no tomatoes anywhere. How can you not notice something like that?

Darwin Awards, anyone?

@ncboxer: Yes, see the Epi-pen comment above. It's about the size of a magic marker and can shoot epinephrine (adrenaline) straight into your system to combat anaphylaxis.

That is horrible. I agree about avoiding restaurants if you have food allergies, though. Not blaming the victim or anything, just saying...

@nytmare: So you mean he knew he was allergic, but just didn't know the severity of it?

I know a couple of people with peanut and bee-sting allergies, and they are VERY cautious when it comes to avoidance. And as far as I know, they've never had to die before (I don't think)...

THis is why if you even SUSPECT you have a major food allergy, you should carry an Epi-Pen at all times.

I dare say that if I had a deadly allergy to just about anything, I'd avoid most restaurants altogether, especially those whose sole aim is to shovel as much food into as many mouths as possible over the shortest period of time.

Maybe that's just me. Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday. Who could put a name on you? Murderer. There, I just did it.

It's not very clear exactly how the screw up happened:
either the person didn't make it clear how important it was (unlikely); or kitchen staff was too lazy to do it right.
I know how busy it can get in a kitchen, but a rote "accidents happen" doesn't make it right.
Wrong foot amputated? Accidents happen. Wrong medication given? Accidents happen.
For crying out loud, take some responsibility! It's true, accidents happen. That's why people are trained- to prevent accidents. For all of these jobs, a monkey could be in there, flailing around. But a person is there to use his/her brain and do the job right.
Especially here- it's not rocket science!

guessing the waitress didn't get a tip due to the screw up. guessing the manager probably picked up the bill too. (probably.)