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CURRENTLY HANDLING: THE KEBAB SHOP E. COLI OUTBREAK

Gomez Trial Attorneys, with co-counsel Ron Simon & Associates, filed the first lawsuit in the California E. coli O157:H7 outbreak tied to beef kofta served at The Kebab Shop. Nine people across five California counties were confirmed ill, with onsets between March 27 and April 30, 2026. Five were hospitalized. Six of the nine are children, and two developed hemolytic uremic syndrome.

The suit was filed in Orange County. The beef kofta came from Olympia Food Industries in Franklin Park, Illinois and was supplied to Kebab Shop locations. The restaurant stopped selling the product on May 18, 2026, and federal inspectors issued a public health alert on May 24 rather than a recall, because the product was already out of circulation. Our case update on the outbreak has the detail.

If you ate at a Kebab Shop location this spring and became ill, the timing matters. Get in touch. The lab work that ties an individual case to a confirmed outbreak strain is time-sensitive.

WHAT A FOOD POISONING CLAIM HAS TO PROVE

Most people who get sick from food never find out what made them sick, and that is the whole problem with these cases. A claim needs two things. Proof that a specific food carried a pathogen, and proof that this food is what made you ill. Feeling terrible after a meal is not enough. What turns a bad night into a case is evidence collected while it still exists.

California helps here more than most states. Food contaminated with a pathogen is generally treated as a defective product, so strict product liability usually applies, and you do not have to prove the restaurant or the processor was careless. You have to prove the food was contaminated when it was sold and that it caused your injury. Defendants do push back. California draws a line between a substance foreign to the food and one natural to it, and that argument gets raised.

Claims also run on negligence and on breach of the implied warranty that food sold for eating is fit to eat. Most cases plead more than one. The strict liability track is usually the strongest.

THE PATHOGENS THAT SUPPORT CLAIMS

SALMONELLA

Onset runs six hours to six days. Poultry, eggs, produce, raw flour. Salmonella turns up in all of them. It is reportable to the health department, so a confirmed case often lands in an active investigation without you doing anything.

E. COLI O157:H7

The dangerous one. Onset usually runs three to four days, though the range is one to ten. The serious risk is hemolytic uremic syndrome, a kidney complication that hits children hardest. Ground beef, leafy greens, and unpasteurized products are recurring sources. Any suspected case needs a doctor, not a wait-and-see.

LISTERIA

Listeria can incubate for weeks. That makes the source hard to trace without lab work. It is especially dangerous during pregnancy and for older adults and anyone immunocompromised. Deli meats, soft cheeses, and ready-to-eat foods are the usual carriers.

CAMPYLOBACTER

A common cause of bacterial illness. Onset is usually two to five days. Undercooked poultry and raw milk are the usual routes. A small share of cases develop Guillain-Barre syndrome weeks later, which is why a later neurological problem should be connected back to the illness.

NOROVIRUS AND HEPATITIS A

Both come from an infected food handler. Norovirus moves fast, typically 12 to 48 hours. Hepatitis A takes far longer, roughly two to seven weeks, and unlike the others there is a vaccine that can prevent illness if given within about two weeks of exposure.

HOW AN OUTBREAK ACTUALLY GETS PROVEN

The link between your illness and a particular food is usually made in a public health lab, not by a lawyer. A doctor confirms a reportable pathogen. The isolate is then genetically sequenced and compared against a national database of other cases. Matching fingerprints is what tells investigators that people in four states got sick from the same lot.

This is why seeing a doctor and giving a stool sample matters so much, and why it has to happen early. No sample, no isolate. No isolate, no match. A person who stayed home and rode it out has a much harder case than one whose specimen sits in a lab connected to a named outbreak.

Local investigation matters too. In San Diego County, suspected food poisoning from a restaurant or market is reported to the Department of Environmental Health, Food and Housing Division at (858) 505-6814. Those complaints trigger inspections. Inspection records, closure orders, and complaint logs are all obtainable later, and they are frequently how a single sick diner turns out to be one of eleven.

THE TRACEABILITY RULE THAT IS NOT HERE YET

It has been pushed back to 2028. A federal rule was built to answer the question every food poisoning case asks, and it is not in force yet. The FDA’s Food Traceability Rule, adopted under the Food Safety Modernization Act, would require companies handling higher-risk foods to keep standardized records tracking each lot through the supply chain. Leafy greens, sprouts, melons, shell eggs, soft cheeses, and ready-to-eat deli salads are on that list.

The original compliance date was January 20, 2026. Then it slipped. In March 2025 the FDA announced its intention to extend the date by 30 months, published the extension in the Federal Register that August, and in November 2025 Congress directed the agency not to enforce the rule before July 20, 2028. That is the position as of August 2026.

Read plainly, that means the records that would let an investigator walk a contaminated bag of spinach back to a specific field are not uniformly required until the summer of 2028. Traceback still happens. It just runs on invoices, shipping records, and whatever each company chose to keep, which is slower and leaves gaps that defendants use.

The consequence for anyone sick right now is unglamorous. Your own evidence matters more. It carries weight the supply chain is not yet required to carry for you. The receipt, the leftovers, the loyalty card record, and the lab-confirmed diagnosis all count.

WHO CAN BE HELD LIABLE

Where strict liability applies, it runs through the chain of distribution in California, so more than one company can be responsible for the same illness. The restaurant or the market that sold the food. The processor or manufacturer that packaged it. The distributor that moved it. The grower, when the contamination started in the field or the water.

Which one is the right defendant depends on where the contamination entered. The traceback answers that, not guesswork. A case that starts against a restaurant often ends against a supplier the diner never heard of.

If your claim is against a public entity, a school district cafeteria or a county facility, the rules change. A written government claim generally has to be presented within six months before a lawsuit can be filed. That deadline catches people. Missing it is not always the end. California allows an application to file a late claim, generally within a year, and a minor’s deadlines can be tolled. Ask rather than assume.

WHAT TO DO IN THE FIRST FEW DAYS

Evidence in these cases has a shelf life measured in days. Some of it is literally perishable.

See a doctor. Say you think it was food and name what you ate, and ask whether a stool culture is appropriate. Without a lab-confirmed pathogen, most claims have nowhere to go. If a sample is taken, ask that the isolate be kept.

Keep the food. Leftovers, the packaging, the receipt, the container. Refrigerate or freeze it and do not throw the wrapper away. The lot code on a package is the single most valuable thing in the trash.

Report it to the health department. In San Diego County, foodborne illness from a restaurant or market goes to (858) 505-6814. A complaint about conditions rather than illness goes to (858) 505-6903. Reporting is free, takes minutes, and creates a dated public record that exists independently of anything your lawyer does later.

Write down the meal. Everything you ate for three days before symptoms started, where, and when. Incubation periods vary enough that the meal you blame is often not the one that did it.

Do not accept a quick offer. Restaurants and their insurers sometimes offer to cover a meal or a medical bill in exchange for a signed release. Signing ends the claim, including for complications that show up later.

SAN DIEGO FOOD POISONING FAQS

DO I NEED A POSITIVE LAB TEST TO HAVE A CASE?

Not always, but it is close to decisive. A lab-confirmed pathogen tied to a named outbreak is the strongest possible evidence, and without one a case has to be built from timing, from other people who got sick at the same place, and from health department findings. Cases without lab confirmation do settle, particularly in a documented outbreak. They are simply harder and worth less.

HOW LONG DO I HAVE TO FILE?

Generally two years. That runs from the date of injury for a personal injury claim in California, and from the date of death for a wrongful death claim. If a public entity is involved, a written claim generally has to be presented to it within six months. The practical deadline is far shorter than any of these, because the food and the lab specimen disappear long before the statute does.

WHAT IF SEVERAL PEOPLE AT MY TABLE GOT SICK?

That helps a great deal. Multiple people sickened by the same meal is exactly the pattern health investigators look for, and California requires clinicians and labs to report two or more cases from separate households suspected of sharing a source immediately by telephone. Each person has their own claim. They are usually investigated together.

CAN I CLAIM FOR A COMPLICATION THAT SHOWED UP LATER?

Yes, and some of the most serious food poisoning injuries are the late ones. Hemolytic uremic syndrome after E. coli, reactive arthritis after salmonella, and Guillain-Barre syndrome after campylobacter can all appear after the acute illness has passed. This is one of several reasons not to settle in the first two weeks.

WHAT DOES A FOOD POISONING LAWYER COST?

Nothing up front. Gomez Trial Attorneys handles food poisoning claims on contingency, so there is no attorney’s fee unless the case recovers money. The firm advances case costs, including the microbiology and medical experts these cases require. Whether any of those costs are charged back if there is no recovery is set out in the written fee agreement, and we go through it with you before you sign. The first conversation is free.

TALK TO A SAN DIEGO FOOD POISONING LAWYER

These cases are usually won on the paper trail. It is short-lived. Health department complaints, inspection reports, lab isolates, invoices, and lot codes all have to be chased before they age out. Gomez Trial Attorneys handles food poisoning claims as part of our defective product and San Diego personal injury practice, and where an illness turns fatal we bring the family’s wrongful death claim.

Call 833-GET-GOMEZ, in English or Spanish, or reach us through our contact page. Do it soon. If the leftovers are still in your refrigerator, call before you clean it out.

This page is general information about California law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. We do not give medical advice. If you are sick, see a doctor.