SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — An Illinois woman who was hospitalized for three days after eating at a Chipotle Mexican Grill in Springfield has filed the first lawsuit arising out of the nationwide Salmonella Javiana outbreak linked to fresh jalapeño peppers, and the only company she has sued is the San Diego importer that brought the peppers into the country.
Kayela Nance, of Ashland in Cass County, filed her complaint on August 14, 2026, in the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois, Springfield Division, Case No. 3:26-cv-03262-CRL-DJQ. The sole defendant is Coast Citrus Distributors, LLC, the California company that federal investigators have identified as the importer and distributor of the jalapeños grown in Sinaloa, Mexico. No restaurant and no grocer is named.
Nance ate at the Chipotle Mexican Grill at 2579 Wabash Avenue in Springfield on June 24 and again on June 25, 2026. She became acutely ill on June 28 with fever as high as 101 degrees, severe abdominal cramping, nausea, and persistent watery diarrhea. On the night of June 30, she went to the emergency department at Jacksonville Memorial Hospital, where she underwent a CT scan of her abdomen and pelvis and was sent home. Her symptoms worsened. On July 2 she presented to the emergency department at Springfield Memorial Hospital and was admitted, where she stayed three days on intravenous fluids and antibiotics before being discharged on July 5 with another course of antibiotics.
A stool specimen collected from Nance on July 2 grew Salmonella. Whole genome sequencing performed on July 10 identified the organism as Salmonella Javiana, WGS ID PNUSAS586065, matching the main clade of outbreak cluster 2607MNJGG-1. The Illinois Department of Public Health and the Cass County Health Department identified her as a confirmed case in the outbreak. Nance works in food service, and the county health department excluded her from her job until her primary care provider released her, costing her wages she has not recovered.
According to FDA’s outbreak advisory, current as of August 14, 345 people in 27 states have been infected with the outbreak strain, 36 have been hospitalized, and no deaths have been reported. Illnesses began between June 19 and July 20, 2026. Of 191 people interviewed, 177, or 93 percent, reported eating at a Mexican-style restaurant in the week before they got sick. CDC has identified 27 illness clusters at Chipotle Mexican Grill and QDOBA locations across seven states. FDA’s traceback investigation pointed to a common grower in Sinaloa that supplies Coast Citrus, and on August 6 the agency announced that Coast Citrus had agreed to recall the implicated peppers and had stopped importing from that grower.
That is the reason the case names one company, said William D. Marler, the food safety lawyer who has represented victims of foodborne illness outbreaks since 1993 and who is co-counsel for Nance.
The contamination did not start on a burrito line in Springfield. It came into this country in a box of peppers, and one company brought that box in and sold it. Everybody downstream — the restaurants, the processors, the grocery chains — bought a contaminated ingredient and served it in good faith. The liability belongs where the pepper entered the food supply.
The scale of that single supply chain is visible in the recalls that have followed. Taylor Fresh Foods recalledtwenty grocery items on August 9. USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service issued a public health alertcovering eighteen meat and poultry products. Whole Foods Market recalled forty-three guacamoles, salsas and pico de gallos made in its own departments on August 12. Albertsons Companies issued two separate notices covering sixty-three store-made items. NatureBest Precut & Produce recalled eighteen NatureBest-brand and H-E-B-brand products, a notice FDA posted on August 14. Together those actions cover roughly 162 individual products, all traced to peppers handled by one importer.
Three things the public still does not have, ten days after FDA named the vehicle: the name of the Sinaloa grower, a recall notice from Coast Citrus itself on FDA’s recall page, and a case count that has moved since August 5. FDA’s advisory still tells consumers, in the same section that lists H-E-B among the stores that received affected product, that Coast Citrus does not appear to supply jalapeños directly to grocery stores.
A grower whose peppers sickened 345 people across 27 states is still anonymous, and the importer that agreed to a recall has never published one. Recalled product with best-by dates running into the middle of this month has been sitting in home refrigerators while the paperwork catches up.
The complaint pleads four causes of action: strict products liability, breach of the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness, negligence, and negligence per se under the Illinois Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, the Illinois Food Handling Regulation Enforcement Act, and the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Nance seeks compensation for medical expenses, lost wages, and past and future pain and suffering, and has demanded a jury trial.
Marler expects the case to be the first of many, and he had one piece of advice for anyone still wondering.
If you ate at a Mexican-style restaurant in June or July, got sick with fever and cramps and diarrhea, and never had a stool test, you are not in these numbers. Ask your doctor for a stool culture. It is the only way an illness becomes a case.
Nance is represented by Gary A. Newland and Erin A. Adamski of Newland & Newland LLP in Arlington Heights, Illinois, and by William D. Marler of Marler Clark, Inc., PS.
About Marler Clark: Marler Clark, The Food Safety Law Firm, is the nation’s leading law firm representing victims of foodborne illness. The firm has represented thousands of individuals in claims against food companies whose contaminated products have caused serious injury and death. The firm was founded out of the 1993 Jack in the Box E. coli outbreak and has litigated foodborne illness cases in nearly every state.
Media contact: William D. Marler, Marler Clark, Inc., PS, 180 Olympic Drive S.E., Bainbridge Island, WA 98110. Telephone 1-800-884-9840. Email bmarler@marlerclark.com.
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