Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY -- An Illinois man who sued PepsiCo after he allegedly found a mouse in his can of Mountain Dew received an interesting response from the company: the soda would turn a mouse to jelly before he ever would have found it.
Roland Ball said he began to drink a can of Mountain Dew he had purchased from a vending machine at his place of employment Nov. 10, 2009, but spit it out when he "tasted something foul," the Madison Record reported.
Ball said he poured the contents of the can into a Styrofoam cup and discovered the remains of a mouse, which he claimed he sent in a mason jar to PepsiCo at the company's request and which was returned in bad condition.
The lawsuit was filed in 2009 and is now going before a judge. An affidavit filed in the Illinois Circuit Court in Madison County contends that it would have been impossible for Ball to find an intact mouse in a can of Mountain Dew that PepsiCo said was produced Aug. 28, 2008.
After thirty days in the fluid, the mouse will have been transformed into a ‘jelly-like' substance.
–Lawrence McGill
The affidavit was provided by Dr. Lawrence D. McGill, a licensed veterinarian who for 22 years has been the technical vice president, director of contact research and clinical services and associate laboratory director for animal reference pathology at the Division of Associated Regional and University Pathologists in Salt Lake City.
McGill said within a week of a mouse being submerged in a fluid with the acidity of Mountain Dew, the mouse would have no calcium in its bones and bony structures, the abdominal structure would rupture and the cranial cavity would also likely rupture. Within thirty days, the structure of the mouse would not be recognizable.
"After thirty days in the fluid, the mouse will have been transformed into a ‘jelly-like' substance," McGill said in the affidavit.
The mouse in question could not have been submerged in Mountain Dew from the time the can was produced, according to McGill. He said his examination of the rodent provided to Pepsi by Ball found the abdominal cavity and other organs intact.
"These findings also establish the mouse had not been in the fluid for more than seven days at most and most certainly was not in the fluid on and since the date of production, Aug. 28, 2008," McGill stated.
PepsiCo claims Ball has provided no evidence the mouse was present in the can of Mountain Dew when he opened it.
PepsiCo claims Ball has provided no evidence the mouse was present in the can of Mountain Dew when he opened it, but Ball contends the evidence was rendered unusable by the company and McGill.
According to an amended complaint submitted to the court, when PepsiCo returned the evidence to the plaintiff, "the evidence was in deplorable condition from having remained saturated in the liquid for such an extended period of time and having been subjected to destructive testing."
The claim is fallacious, according to McGill; he said he returned the mouse in formaldehyde, not in the Mountain Dew in question.
McGill also said "any competent, qualified consultant" would be able to conduct an examination of the mouse's remains.
Ball is seeking $50,000 in damages. PepsiCo is scheduled to defend itself Jan 11. in Madison County.
Email: sgrimes@ksl.com
