A Baltimore County woman is suing a Pikesville supermarket and ice cream manufacturers that she says sold products contaminated with listeria and led to the death of her newborn baby, according to a complaint filed in Baltimore County Circuit Court this month.
The plaintiff, Tova Louie, of Baltimore, is seeking up to $30 million in damages, according to the lawsuit.
“Tova Louie is a plaintiff that was severely and permanently damaged by the actions of the defendants,” which are listed as Seven Mile Food Market in Pikesville, along with producers Ice Cream House and Real Kosher Ice Cream, both of Brooklyn, New York, and Leiby’s Dairy Inc. in Pennsylvania, her attorney, Yehoshua Bier, said in court documents.
On June 28, 2023, Louie bought a 56-ounce container of Klein’s Vanilla Fudge Ice Cream from the Seven Mile Market. For the next three days, she experienced symptoms of a sinus infection, headaches and abdominal discomfort, according to the complaint.
Louie was 36 weeks pregnant at the time and visited a MedStar Health: Urgent Care twice because of the ailments, the suit says. She also visited her obstetrician to monitor the baby’s health.
On July 29, 2023, she went to the emergency room at Sinai Hospital, where her baby was diagnosed as “lethargic, with no spontaneous activity,” court documents say. Due to the concerns for the baby’s health, a “painful and traumatic Vacuum Extraction,” or an emergency delivery, was initiated, according to the suit. The baby was then transferred to the Johns Hopkins Hospital after she was able to breathe and had improvement in color but continued to be limp.
None of the defendants could be reached for comment Thursday, and no attorneys were listed for them in court records. Bier could not be reached for comment Thursday either.
The doctors at Hopkins performed blood tests and determined that Louie and the baby were suffering from a listeria infection, according to court documents. The infection allegedly had been passed through the placenta from the mother to the infant while in utero.
After months of procedures, the infant died Nov. 8, 2023, from “listeria and other listeria-related complications,” according to to the complaint.
Listeria is an organism that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The bacteria that can contaminate many foods, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Listeria infection can be especially harmful for pregnant women, newborns and adults aged 65 or older
Although healthy individuals might suffer only short-term symptoms such as high fever, severe headache, stiffness, nausea, abdominal pain and diarrhea, the FDA says listeria infections can cause miscarriages and stillbirths among pregnant women.
On June 28, 2023, the same day Louie bought the product, Ice Cream House voluntarily recalled all of its dairy and nondairy products because of a listeria health risk.
Louie’s attorney said she “suffered and continues to suffer immeasurable pain for not only the loss of her child, but the months of illness to herself and her child, and immeasurable pain and suffering” because of the illness. Louie is suing for negligence, product liability and breach of warranty, among other issues.
This is not the first case of ice cream reportedly tainted with listeria in the region.
In March, the FDA requested a permanent injunction against a former Owings Mills-based Totally Cool Inc. ice cream company, which filed for bankruptcy after listeria was detected at one of its production lines during an unannounced inspection.
The FDA detected listeria around one of Totally Cool’s production lines in late May 2024, and on June 21, it directed the company to shut down all of its product lines. This forced the ice cream manufacturer to lay off 68 of its 71 employees and “suffer the loss of all revenue streams,” according to the bankruptcy filing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Maryland in June 2024.
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