Three arrested on raw milk-related charges in L.A.
By Stuart Pfeifer and P.J. Huffstutter
LOS ANGELES -- The owner of a Los Angeles health food market and two other people were arrested on charges related to the allegedly unlawful production and sale of unpasteurized dairy products, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County district attorney's office said. The arrests of James Cecil Stewart, Sharon Ann Palmer and Eugenie Bloch on Wednesday marked the latest effort in a government crackdown on the sale of so-called raw dairy products. Prosecutors in Los Angeles alleged that Stewart, 64, operates a market called Rawesome Foods through which he illegally sold dairy products that did not meet health standards because they were unpasteurized or were produced at unlicensed facilities. Palmer, 51, has operated Healthy Family Farms in Santa Paula, Calif., since 2007 without the required licensing for milk production, prosecutors allege. She and her company face nine charges related to the production of unpasteurized milk products. Bloch, a Healthy Family Farms employee, is charged with three counts of conspiracy.
The arrests followed a one-year investigation in which undercover agents bought unpasteurized products from Healthy Family Farms stands in Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, said Matthew Krasnowski, a district attorney spokesman. The products included unpasteurized goat milk, cheese and yogurt.
The arrests came the same week that federal and state health officials warned the public about a food-borne illness outbreak tied to ground turkey contaminated with antibiotic-resistant salmonella, an outbreak in which one Californian has died and 76 others, including one Oregon infant, have fallen ill so far. It also marks the latest salvo in the government's crackdown on unpasteurized dairy products...... Read The Rest Here
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