A New York woman claims she discovered a human fingertip in food she purchased from a local restaurant.
Mary Elizabeth Smith, 43, of Manhattan, alleges the incident happened on Nov. 17, 2023, after she ordered a chicken wrap “to go” at Create Astoria, a Mediterranean restaurant in Queens, according to a legal complaint obtained by PEOPLE that was filed in the New York County Supreme Court on Aug. 7. The restaurant, however, calls her claim “impossible” and “ludicrous.”
In the complaint, Smith’s attorney, Robert Menna, states that Smith bit into the chicken wrap and found “human tissue, a fingertip” inside.
The complaint further claims that “negligence” on the restaurant’s part caused Smith to “sustain serious injuries and suffer pain, shock and mental anguish.”
“She ordered a chicken wrap, and when she bit into it, there was a piece of a finger there. Luckily, she didn’t swallow it. But it still traumatized her,” Menna said in a statement to PEOPLE.
Menna added that his office sent the fingertip to a lab for testing, which confirmed it was tissue from a human female.
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He noted, however, that the restaurant asserts it had no female employees working that day. Create’s insurance company, Liberty Mutual, has denied Smith’s allegations.
“So we will let the court take care of it,” Menna said.
Create’s owner, Teddy Karagiannis, called the lawsuit “completely fraudulent” in a statement to PEOPLE and said he plans to countersue Smith “for slander.”
“It’s just ludicrous,” he said, adding that food served at his restaurant goes through multiple inspection points before reaching customers.
“It’s impossible. It cannot happen in my style of operation,” Karagiannis added.
Karagiannis also claimed that Smith has declined DNA testing on the fingertip, which he believes would show it did not come from one of his employees. He speculated that the fingertip could have originated elsewhere.
Smith, meanwhile, reportedly told the New York Post that she was “permanently traumatized” by the experience and had to undergo strong antiretroviral therapy to protect against potential exposure to serious diseases.
