Despite its promise to remove any product "if there is any doubt about its safety or quality," Trader Joe's dark chocolates remain on shop shelves.
"Trader Joe's stands by the safety of its products," a lawyer for the popular specialty grocer said in response to a Consumer Reports investigation
that found high amounts of hazardous heavy metals—lead and cadmium—in 23 popular dark chocolate bars, including two from Trader Joe's.
In December's study, Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate Lover's Chocolate Bar 85% Cacao and Dark Chocolate 72% Cacao tested high in lead and both heavy metals.
"[C]onsistent, long-term exposure to even small amounts of heavy metals can lead to a variety of health problems
As a result of the highly publicized investigation, Trader Joe's is facing at least three federal class-action lawsuits,
two in New York State (Ferrante and Herd) and one in its home state of California (Waring).
All three complaints accuse the company of harming shoppers by failing to mark products with heavy metals.
Two of the suits allege that Trader Joe's knew about heavy metals in their dark chocolates since 2014, when a consumer advocacy group tested the products and
informed the corporation. "Since then, however, Trader Joe's has systematically failed to mitigate lead and cadmium levels