Criminal Investigation of Growers Express and Natural Selection Foods
The US Attorney's Office has announced that agents of the FBI and FDA Office of Criminal Investigations executed two search warrants today on Growers Express in Salinas, CA, and Natural Selection Foods in San Juan Batista, CA, in connection with the September 2006 outbreak of E. coli 0157:H7 that the FDA has traced to spinach grown in the Salinas area.
United States Attorney Kevin V. Ryan stated that "I want to reassure the public that there is no indication in this investigation that leaf spinach was deliberately or intentionally contaminated. We are investigating allegations that certain spinach growers and distributors may not have taken all necessary or appropriate steps to ensure that their spinach was safe before it was placed into interstate commerce. . . ."
The federal government is most likely attempting to build a criminal case against Growers Express and Natural Selection Foods based on the 1938 Federal Food Drug and Cosmetics Act, which makes it a crime to sell or distribute adulterated food products, which can include the following: 1) food that consists in whole or in part of any filthy, putrid, or decomposed substance, or is otherwise unfit for food and 2) food that has been prepared, packed, or held under unsanitary conditions whereby it may have become contaminated with filth, or whereby it may have been rendered injurious to health (21 U.S.C. Sec. 342).
The government will not have to prove that Growers Express and Natural Selection Foods intentionally adulterated spinach. It is only necessary for the government to prove that the companies were negligent in their duties to keep the tainted spinach from the market.
Fred Pritzker is a nationally-recognized foodborne illness litigator. To contact him, please call toll-free at 1-888-377-8900, e-mail fhp@pritzkerlaw.com or fill out the online, attorney-consultation form.
