WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (Legal Newsline) - The maker of Polaner fruit spreads calls the woman who filed a class action lawsuit against it "a captive serial litigant."
B&G Foods filed a motion to dismiss March 20 in New York federal court as it fights claims the term "All Fruit" on it labels is misleading to consumers because the spreads contain citric acid and natural flavors.
"Plaintiff does not specifically allege, however, that the citric acid and natural flavors in All Fruit do not come from fruit," the motion says.
"Instead, she makes general allegations about where the 'industry' often gets citric acid and natural flavors. This fails to carry her burden of alleging that B&G Foods made a false statement."
Plaintiff Deena Indiviglio is a plaintiff in at least two other similar cases, B&G says. Her lawyer is Spencer Sheehan of Sheehan & Associates.
Their case claims the product label's statement of "sweetened only with fruit juice" further convinces the consumer the product contains all fruit ingredients.
They also claim consumers pay a "premium" price for Polaner expecting it to have less processed and more natural ingredients and rely on the words "all fruit" on the label. Indiviglio claims B&G's actions violate multi-state consumer fraud laws.
But B&G says the complaint consists "entirely of non-sequiturs."
"Plaintiff first admits that 'citric acid is an organic acid in a variety of fruits, especially citrus' but then alleges that 'when used as an ingredient in other foods [it] is not derived from fruits but industrially produced by fermentation from the fungus Aspergillus niger," the motion says.
"Plaintiff further surmises that citric acid derived from fermentation is 'used by industry.' Fatally, Plaintiff never directly alleges anything about the citric acid in Polaner All Fruit. The same is true regarding Plaintiff's claims about natural flavors."