SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Tuna companies do not have to put
labels on their cans warning the fish contains mercury, a San
Francisco judge ruled in rebuffing a lawsuit brought by
California’s attorney general.
In a Thursday decision publicized on Friday, San Francisco
Superior Court Judge Robert Dondero ruled against state
Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who in 2004 sought to ban the
sale of canned tuna without mercury warnings.
Lockyer sued Del Monte Foods, maker of StarKist tuna;
Bumble Bee Seafoods, a unit of Connors Brothers Income Fund of
Canada, maker of Bumble Bee tuna; and Tri-Union Seafoods, maker
of Chicken of the Sea tuna.
The complaint alleged the firms violated state Proposition
65, an initiative approved by voters in 1986 to require firms
to issue warnings before exposing people to “known carcinogens
or reproductive toxins.”
Scientists have found that nearly all fish contain trace
amounts of mercury but some species, including tuna and
swordfish, can have higher levels.
“The judge has made a common-sense ruling based on
nutrition and science,” tuna industry lawyer Forrest
Hainlinesaid in a statement. “It’s easy to see that canned tuna
has always been an extremely healthy and important food source
despite extremists’ attempts to raise irrelevant and misleading
arguments.”
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