A Mentor man who claims StarKist Co. has fishy business practices is seeking $64,000 in damages.
Acting as his own attorney, Bryan Anthony Reo filed a lawsuit Dec. 23 in Lake County Common Pleas Court against the Pittsburgh-based company.
According to the suit, StarKist committed statutory violations of the Ohio Consumer Sales Practices Act by underfilling cans of tuna by about three-tenths of 1 ounce to four-tenths of 1 ounce each and then placing the cans “into the stream of commerce” to be sold to customers.
During 2013 and 2014, Reo said he bought at least several hundred cans of StarKist chunk light tuna to have an emergency food reserve and because he often eats a can a day.
“I like it. It’s low-fat, high protein,” said Reo when contacted by telephone.
Reo, who is not an attorney, said he still has numerous unopened cans from 2013 and 2014.
Reo said he is seeking between $200 to $3,000 per can for the 20 cans he can prove were underfilled, and other costs, for a total of $64,000.
According to Walmart.com, a 4 pack of Starkist Chunk Light Tuna in water is $3.98. An oz. of tuna runs about 20 cents and each can is 5 ounces.
If what this guy is saying is true and Starkist has been scamming people out of three-tenths of an ounce of tuna per can, then they’ve been stealing 6 cents per can from people. You’re only getting $0.93 cents worth of tuna for $0.99 cents. And that’s BULLSHIT.
Now normally I would probably call this guy an idiot. He’s trying to make $3,000 off of a can of tuna that he lost $0.06 cents on. Sounds pretty dumb. But I just can’t bring myself to hate this move. This is America in 2015. If companies are trying to scam you, you scam them back twice or 3x as hard.
You want to save six pennies worth of tuna? Alright well now you owe me 3 grand. I don’t make the rules, that’s just what it is. You can throw your little jab, I’ll answer with a haymaker right in the kisser.
I won’t stand for Big Tuna trying to take advantage of the little minnows (us, the consumers) to try and save a couple cents. Down with Big Tuna I say!
Bottlegate 
Read the Ohio Consumer Sales Practices Act and see that it provides $200 in damages per transaction, up to $5,000 in non-economic, per transaction. Starkist already settled a class action lawsuit for over $20 million, yet only offered $50 in tuna or $20 in cash to the basic consumers they wronged. When you eat 1 can per day for 4 years, then you can complain about it… Imagine how much the company made in profits over the period in question… Tens of billions of cans, each potentially underfilled by the amount in question…
http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/1345
Ohio Revised Code 1345.01
LikeLike