Girl Gets $5 Million In E. Coli Suit 4-Year-Old Suffers From Numerous Medical Problems

A 4-year-old girl has won $5 million from the Jack in the Box fast-food chain because a 1993 hamburger bacteria outbreak cost her a third of her colon and caused kidney and pancreas damage.

Cheray Jefferson must use a colostomy bag, and has a 30 percent to 70 percent chance of developing diabetes as a result of her infection by a deadly strain of the E. Coli bacteria, her lawyers said.

She was among more than 600 people in the West who became sick from the bacteria E. coli O157:H7, which grew in contaminated, undercooked hamburger. Three children died in Washington.

The settlement of her lawsuit was approved Monday by U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly in Seattle.”The family is happy with the settlement,” Nancy Bourgois, one of the girl’s attorneys, said Wednesday.

Doctors estimated Cheray’s future medical costs at up to $3.3 million. Eventually, she probably will need kidney dialysis or a transplant, said her kidney specialist, Dr. Ellis Avner.

Karen Bachmann, a spokeswoman at Jack in the Box’s parent company, Foodmaker Inc. of San Diego, had no comment on the settlement.

Twelve-year-old Brianne Kiner of Seattle won a $15.6 million settlement two months ago. In addition to kidney, pancreatic and intestinal damage, she developed asthma and suffered a stroke which left her with a learning disability.