Marler Clark, the nation's food safety law firm, has donated $50,000 to the Dave Theno Food Safety Fellowship, a partnership between Stop Foodborne Illness and Michigan State University's Online Food Safety Program. The fellowship was created in 2017 to enable young food scientists to work closely with Stop Foodborne Illness and to learn from members who have experienced the consequences of failures in food safety firsthand. The fellow will work fulltime for Stop Foodborne Illness and complete a 12 credit online food safety certificate with Michigan State University.
"We're honored to have donated a total of $200,000 to this worthy cause. All who care about food safety should consider doing the same," said Bill Marler. "We will miss his humanity and leadership."
Dave Theno became head of Jack in the Box’s food safety shortly after the 1992-1993 outbreak. Bill Marler litigated cases in this outbreak and personally witnessed how this tragedy affected Dave and served as a lifelong inspiration to make food safer.
Dave Theno's awards and memberships included:
- NSF Lifetime Achievement Award
- American Association of Food Hygiene Veterinarians
- American Meat Science Association
- International Association of Food Protection
- International Meat & Poultry HACCP Alliance
- Institute of Food Technologists
- National Advisory Committee on Meat & Poultry Inspection
- National Advisory Committee for Microbiological Criteria for Foods
- National Cattlemen’s Beef Association’s Beef Industry Food Safety Council
- National Meat Association
- Black Pearl Award by the International Association of Food Protection
- Innovator of the Year Award from Nation’s Restaurant News
- California Environmental Health Association’s Mark Nottingham Award
- Nation’s Restaurant News “Top 50 Players”
- STOP’s Hero Award and Scholarship