A man sued a restaurant after a bone in his 'boneless' wings got lodged in his throat. He lost.

• A man in Ohio said he had to go to the ER after a bone in a boneless wing got lodged in his throat.
• The man sued the restaurant, its supplier, and a chicken farm, but he lost his case.

A restaurant in Ohio was found "not negligent" for injuries sustained by a man who found a bone in wings that had been advertised as "boneless," Ohio's Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.

A lawsuit filed in 2017 said that while eating at Wings on Brookwood, a restaurant in Hamilton, in April 2016, Michael Berkheimer "suddenly felt a foreign object in his throat" but was unable to dislodge it.

The lawsuit said that after three days — during which Berkheimer said he struggled to eat — he went to the emergency room with a high fever, and physicians found a chicken bone lodged in his throat.

A doctor removed the bone, thought to be about an inch and a half long, the lawsuit said. Berkheimer said the bone tore his esophagus, causing a bacterial infection and other medical issues.

Berkheimer filed the lawsuit the next year against Wings on Brookwood as well as its food supplier and a chicken farm. After the Butler County Court of Common Pleas sided with the defendants, he took the case to the 12th District Court of Appeals, which similarly found the defendants weren't negligent.

Both courts said that because bones are naturally found in chicken breasts and not a foreign object added to them, a consumer could have reasonably expected to find them in their food and guarded against this. As a result, the courts said, the restaurant didn't breach its duty of care.

Boneless wings keep confusing diners

Boneless wings aren't actually wings at all, and it confuses some diners.

They're typically made from strips or chunks of chicken-breast meat that are breaded and fried. The name is used to differentiate them from bone-in wings.

The confusion has led to at least one lawsuit. In 2023, a man sued Buffalo Wild Wings, claiming that the name of its boneless wings was misleading.

Before it added boneless wings to its menu this year, Popeyes considered alternative names, like "bites."

And International Wings Factory in New York City simply refers to the product as "boneless chicken."

'Boneless wing' is 'merely a description of the cooking style'

Berkheimer said in court documents that he cut the boneless wing into three pieces to eat.

"A bone of that size would have encompassed nearly the entire third bite of the boneless wing," the ruling from the appellate court said, adding, "We conclude a reasonable person could have anticipated and guarded against a similarly large-sized bone concealed in a bite size piece of chicken."

Berkheimer also appealed to Ohio's Supreme Court, which supported the Court of Appeals' ruling.

In response to Berkheimer's argument that the product was described as a "boneless wing," the Supreme Court said that it's "common sense that that label was merely a description of the cooking style" and that it wasn't a guarantee the chicken wouldn't contain any bones.

In statements to Business Insider, Berkheimer's lawyers expressed disappointment with the ruling and said it rendered the word "boneless" "completely meaningless."

Wings on Brookwood, the food supplier, and the chicken farm did not immediately respond to requests for comment from BI.