The case went viral within days.
Chicken listed on an Ohio restaurant menu as “boneless” turned out to have bones in it.
One hidden bone punctured a customer’s esophagus, leading to a disastrous infection that nearly killed him—and forever changed his life.
The victim sought a jury trial to seek compensation for his injuries and loss, but the Ohio Supreme Court denied him that jury trial.
Why?
Because according to appointed Ohio Justice Joe Deters (who’d never been a judge before) and 3 Republican colleagues, that man (and anyone else in Ohio) should have expected there to be bones in those “boneless” wings.
Let me say that again: the Court ruled that the victim should’ve expected that chicken listed as “boneless” would include bones, and therefore “guarded against the presence.” Not only that, the court ruled that that this conclusion was so clear that no reasonable juror would ever have found otherwise—so the court refused to let the victim bring his case before a jury of his peers.
So after nearly dying, and undergoing two induced comas, a long hospital stay, years of pain and injury, lost jobs, and years of litigation, the victim never got his day in court.
All because a Justice with zero judicial experience—who only got the job by trading political favors and who is supported by insurance and big business interests—denied it to him.
At one point in the decision, Justice Deters wrote the following: “A diner reading ‘boneless wings’ on a menu would no more believe that the restaurant was warranting the absence of bones in the items than believe that the items were made from chicken wings, just as a person eating ‘chicken fingers,’ would know that he had not been served fingers.”
!!!
The response to such inanity was fast and furious.
Stephen Colbert ripped it mercilessly: "In poultry adjudication news, the Ohio Supreme Court has ruled that chicken wings advertised as boneless can have bones. Then what's the point of anything?!"
Colbert called it "hot legal garbage."
Then Merriam-Webster weighed in, noting that “boneless” had exploded as one of its most searched words of the week, then corrected the Ohio Supreme Court:
“We define the relevant sense of bone as “one of the hard parts of the skeleton of a vertebrate.” Senses of boneless in our unabridged dictionary include “being without a bone” (as in “jellyfish are boneless”) and “having the bone or bones removed.”"
Meet Mike Berkheimer, the Victim in the Case
Well, given all the attention, I decided to talk to the actual victim—Mike Berkheimer— in this case, and his attorney, Robb Shokar.
I hope you’ll listen to the interview above—and take the time to meet Mike and hear his story.
Because what you will hear is a case study of how a broken and politicized Supreme Court and Ohio justice system is stacked against everyday Ohioans. You’ll hear the pain. The suffering:
The injustice. The sense that there is no opportunity to have one’s day in court even in a case as egregious as this. The fact that you can lose your right to a jury trial based on illogic that any 10-year old could see right through.
While our conversation is, at moments, informal and jovial as Mike is bravely making the best of a terrible situation and decision, you will also see that it is heartbreaking. A former hockey player whose life will never be the same—denied his day in court via logic that defies even the dictionary.
Please WATCH the interview above and you’ll see what I mean. (I couldn’t sleep last night, thinking about what Mike has gone through, and the injustice of Deters’ ruling).
The Bigger Problem
It’s bad enough that the Ohio Supreme Court just declared Ohio to be a place where customers (including parents of kids) can't even rely on assurances as clear-cut as that chicken is “boneless.”
But the impact of this decision goes further than potential victims like Mike.
Because this same court will also be deciding the meaning of words such as “reproductive freedom,” or “fair districts,” in upcoming months and years. And this is the same court (4-3 decision) that recently approved wholly misleading ballot language about our ballot issue to end gerrymandering—leaving the false impression that voting “Yes” on a measure to ban gerrymandering will actually lead to gerrymandering.
Absurd. Lawless.
And that’s the dangerous signal sent so clearly by this case. Because a court willing to tell the world, with a straight face, that the word “boneless” can be interpreted as including bones, is clearly poised to warp the meaning of any words that appear before it.
And that should scare everyone.
Support Flipping the Court
But there’s one ray of hope amid this terrible case. And it’s why I so appreciate Mike being willing to tell his story.
It is that Justice Deters is on the Ohio ballot right now. So are two of the Democratic Justices who dissented in this case.
If Justice Melody Stewart wins, Justice Deters (who chose to challenge her, as opposed to defending his own seat) will no longer be on the court.
If Justice Mike Donnelly, who wrote the dissent in this case (calling the decision “utter jabberwocky”—“[w]hen they read the word ‘boneless,’ they think that it means ‘without bones,’ as do all sensible people”), and Judge Lise Forbes win, we flip the Court entirely.
And flipping the court means that victims like Mike have a fair shot at justice. And the plain words of the law will be read as they should be, and not contorted as they continue to be by the current court.
Please help elect these three candidates by giving HERE.
Please help right this injustice.
Please help everyday Ohioans like Mike get their day in court.
The Disturbing Details and Deep Injustice of Ohio’s "Boneless Chicken" Case