An E. coli case was filed in Yellowstone County District Court, last week.
A woman ate food that she purchased at the McDonald's on Southgate Drive in Billings and then became ill.
The McDonald's E. coli outbreak that struck 13 states across the country also hit Montana.
Thirteen cases have been reported including eight in Yellowstone County and now the lawsuits have begun.
Billings resident Candina Craft says she ate a Quarter-pounder on Sept. 29.
According to court documents, she had a loss of appetite, nausea, abdominal pain and cramping.
Eight days later, she went to the emergency room where a CT scan revealed wall thickening and inflammation of the colon.
“The injuries that we see in these situations can be quite severe,” said Drew Falkenstein, Craft’s attorney. “They can be catastrophic and life-changing.”
Falkenstein is representing Craft and other Montana victims including a father and his 11-month-old daughter who shared a hamburger at McDonald's in Belgrade.
The infant was hospitalized for more than a week.
Falkenstein's firm, Marler Clark in Seattle, has filed case for 19 people against McDonald's, four in Montana.
“We represent a couple of families, up in northwest Montana out in the Kalispell area, who had a person in their family die as a result of their illnesses in the McDonald’s outbreak,” Falkenstein said. “The cases filed in Gallatin and Yellowstone counties don't involve, fortunately, don't involve that outcome.”
Craft's lawsuit targeting McDonald's says she remains weak, sensitive to certain foods, and has not regained her full appetite.
Federal investigators have identified slivered onions from Taylor farms in Colorado as a source of the outbreak.
Those onions were sent to about 900 McDonald's restaurants.
“Their responsibilities are if they do detect it on some kind of product sampling, which there may have been in this case, then their obligation is obviously to not distribute that product,” Falkenstein said.
The lawsuits allege four counts including two counts of negligence.
Falkenstein’s firm specializes in food safety cases and is now representing more than a dozen victims across the country with that number expected to rise.
“I’m sure that, that we will be contacted by people over the next few months,” Falkenstein said.
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