United Airlines Inc. has managed to get a troublesome lawsuit moved from state to federal court wher on Nov. 19 it will argue that the judge should dismiss the case before goes any further.

The civil action was brought against United by Marcia Lee, who was from March 3 to Sept. 11, 2017, the airline’s senior manager for food safety. The Chicago-based carrier recruited Lee for the job. She was previously a senior food and drug inspector for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Bureau of Environmental Health, Division of Food and Drugs.

Lee ‘s tenure with United was short but coincides with some incidents involving the airline’s flight kitchens, most notability at its Denver and Newark, NJ, hubs.

In her multifaceted lawsuit, Lee contends she was recruited to join United based upon certain false, material misrepresentations concerning United’s intention “to address, cure, and resolve known food and food product processing and handling safety issues.”

After six months, Lee concluded United was not interested in fixing its food safety problems, so she quit. She says “United has a significant track record of serious violations of federal, state, and local food health law, rules and regulations spanning many years.”

United’s Denver flight kitchen
The civil lawsuit claims United tried to “hide the problem” at its “Journey Cuisine” flight kitchen at Denver International Airport “by subjecting the facility to numerous, multi-day ‘deep cleanings’ orchestrated by one or more United upper management employees who attempted to mislead the FDA by eliminating the filthy conditions in the few days immediately before the FDA descended upon the United facility for an emergency inspection.”

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspected the Denver flight kitchen from Jan. 12 to Feb. 1, 2017, and issued a violation notice. During the incident, United’s Chelsea Food Services, doing business as Journey Cuisine, recalled 28,000 pounds of pork and chicken burritos and wrap products for potential Listeria monocytogenes contamination.

The ready-to-eat pork and chicken products were produced by Journey between Sept. 11, 2017, and Oct. 26, 2017. They were shipped mostly to King Soopers retail locations in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. Shortly thereafter, King Soopers announced it would be getting a new vendor for the products.

Journey Cuisine had notified the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) on Oct. 30 that one of its burrito products had tested positive for Listeria  monocytogenes. The flight kitchen reported four other products could have been affected based on common ingredients.

None of the suspect products were going to airline passengers and there were no reports of illnesses associated with the recalled products.

Lee’s complaint says that “upon information and belief, United is considered by the FDA to be a bad actor when it comes to serious food safety violations causing or potentially causing sickness, death and significant harm to United’s passengers.”

Lee further points to problems at United’s large flight kitchen at Newark International Airport. She cites a recent closure ordered by local and regional officials after “the discovery of conditions in violations of food safety laws, rules, codes, and/or regulations, conditions which created a significant risk of serious bodily hard, sickness, and potentially death, to workers in the facility as well as to United’s passengers.”

She says the unsafe practices and conditions at Newark existed during her tenure.