Peanut Exec Sentenced to 28 Years in Prison for Salmonella Outbreak

A man whose mother died from eating tainted peanut butter was among those who told a federal judge on Monday that the Parnells should receive stiff prison time.

Stewart Parnell was convicted past year of knowingly shipping food tainted with the bacteria and of faking laboratory records which testified his products were safe to eat.

Three people convicted over a nationwide salmonella outbreak were sentenced Monday to tough sentences of up to 28 years in prison, the US Justice Department said. The 61-year-old’s brother, Michael Parnell, who worked as a food broker for the company was sentenced to 20 years, and a manger at the company, Mary Wilkerson, was sentenced to five years in prison. The recall of Salmonella-tainted peanut products was one of the largest in history.

This case is considered by some experts to be “the first food-poisoning trial of American food processors”, Associated Press reported. “I’m truly, truly sorry for what’s happened”, the Reuters agency quoted Stewart Parnell as telling a federal judge in Albany, Georgia, before the sentencing on 21 September.

Families of all the victims infected by salmonella after ingesting products from Parnell’s company, spent the morning proposing the judge to issue the strictest possible sentence.

“It should be enough to send a message to the other manufacturers that this is not going to be tolerated anymore and they had better inspect their food”, said Randy Napier, whose 80-year-old mother in Ohio was also among the nine who died. Then Samuel Lightsey, the former Blakely plant manager who was at Stewart Parnell’s side when the pair decided not to testify before Congress in the midst of the 2008-09 outbreak, also cut a deal.

Parnell’s company filed for bankruptcy shortly after it was shut down in 2009. It came down after Parnell, in a shaky voice, spoke to those he had harmed.

Sands has presided over the criminal case since February 2013, when Stewart Parnell and four other defendants were named in a 76-count felony indictment involving charges of conspiracy, fraud, and shipping food that was contaminated and misbranded. “You took my mom”, said Almer.

Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor, said Parnell’s sentence will make corporate executives think twice before engaging in wrongful activities.

“Until today, none of the defendants had expressed remorse for the murders they committed”, Burley said.

More than 700 people were sickened in the outbreak and nine people died, according to the CDC, though it was not certain that each death was due to salmonella poisoning.

Michael Moore, US Attorney of the Middle District of Georgia, said: “The tragedy of this case is that at a peanut processing plant in Middle Georgia, protecting the public lost out to increasing of profits. “. Jurors, who heard evidence of unsanitary conditions that included roaches, rodents, bird droppings and a leaky roof, were unconvinced.

In May, another peanut butter producer, ConAgra, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor criminal charge of violating the FDA protocol in connection with a salmonella outbreak.