Sentencing scheduled for peanut executive in salmonella case

The detecting for 61-year old Stewart Parnell is schedule for now, in Albany, Georgia.

Company e-mails dug up by investigators suggested that Stewart Parnell and the other defendants knew the plant was shipping tainted products. Other batches were never tested at all, but got shipped with fake lab records saying salmonella screenings were negative. The 61-year-old former CEO who was convicted on 72 counts of fraud, conspiracy and other federal charges could face up to 803 years in prison.

The 2009 salmonella outbreak involving tainted peanut butter sickened more than 714 people and caused nine deaths, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and led to one of the country’s largest food recalls.

The Honorable Judge Sand’s Order setting forth what relevant conduct of the defendants would be used in determining sentencing landed in my inbox a few moments ago.

A former food-company owner/executive will face sentencing on Monday, and he could find himself jailed for the rest of his life.

“No one else should need to really go through what we did, watching my mom die”.

Attorneys in the case say capacious proof from victims seeking sentences that are harsh and defendants’ relatives could thrust at the sentencing proceeding into another day. Almer and his sister, Ginger Lorentz of Brainerd, are expected to give statements before the court, though Parnell’s lawyers have argued that food outbreak victims are not crime victims under federal law.

Whatever punishment he gets, Parnell seems to be preparing for an extended stay in prison. In April, Parnell and his wife put the Lynchburg, Virginia, home they have owned since 1983 on the market for $699,000.

“Stewart has been penalized – he’s lost everything he is ever assembled, he is unemployable and he can not provide for his family”, said Ken Hodges, one of Parnell’s defense attorneys. “I am sorry that people got sick from his peanut butter and died from his peanut butter”. Prosecutors have recommended a life sentence for Parnell; 17 to 23 years for his brother Michael Parnell; and at least eight years for the company’s quality control manager, Mary Wilkerson. She was convicted of obstruction of justice.