A Detroit judge has agreed to revisit a McDonald’s settlement case in which a local lawyer was asked to remove damaging Facebook posts following a $700,000 win against the fast food giant.
Ahmed Ahmed of Dearborn Heights sued a local McDonald’s location after he learned that its promise of halal meat for Muslim customers was in fact incorrect. The Dearborn location had promised that its meat met all Muslim dietary requirements.
Following the settlement Dearborn resident and lawyer Majed Moughni criticized the fast food chain on Facebook. Moughni spoke out against McDonald’s for failing to award damages to other customers who may have unwittingly purchased non-halal meat.
Moughni was asked to remove his Facebooks posts shortly after they went public. McDonald’s argued that the posts contained legal inaccuracies that could lead outside observers to believe that Moughni was somehow involved in the settlement.
Despite those legal inaccuracies the non-profit organization Public Citizen appeared in court to argue on his behalf, using the First Amendment to argue for the posts.
According to a McDonald’s rep:
“We plan to repost notice of the settlement to ensure that all potential class members are given every opportunity to evaluate their options.”
In the meantime if you are looking for a Dearborn lawyer who uses factually incorrect legal information we have a name for you…
Some cute phrasings here, but not actually correct. As our brief explained in some detail, the supposed inaccuracies were largely either opinions that McDonald's and class counsel did not like, or mischaracterizations of what Moughni had said, but complaints about phrasing and not substance https://www.citizen.org/litigation/forms/cases/getlinkforcase.cfm?cID=813.