UPDATE: 3 Companies Indicted in Pet Food Case

This story got about 30 seconds on the morning news today, with no details given about the companies. As a pet owner, I think it deserves a little more coverage from the media. I remember all too well the anxiety of the pet food recall last year. And as a friend, I know several people who lost their pets to tainted food. Knowing that those who made money off the total disregard for the lives of our loyal companions are bring brought to justice is some small comfort.

From the AP:

Two Chinese businesses and a U.S. company were indicted Wednesday in the tainted pet food incidents that killed potentially thousands of animals last year and raised worries about products made in China.

Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co.; Suzhou Textiles, Silk, Light Industrial Products Arts and Crafts I/E Co.; and Las Vegas-based ChemNutra Inc. were charged in two separate but related indictments.

The U.S. attorney's office in Kansas City said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has received consumer reports suggesting 1,950 cats and 2,200 dogs died after eating food contaminated with the toxic chemical melamine.

The indictments allege that Suzhou Textiles, an export broker, mislabeled 800 metric tons of tainted wheat gluten manufactured by Xuzhou to avoid inspection in China. Suzhou then did not properly declare the contaminated product it shipped to the U.S. as a material to be used in food, the indictment says.

It also says the shipment was falsely declared to the Chinese government in a way that would avoid a mandatory inspection of the company's plants.

"The defendants intended to deceive the Chinese government in addition to consumers," Wood said.

According to the indictment, ChemNutra picked up the melamine-tainted product at a port of entry in Kansas City, then sold it to makers of various brands of pet foods. The indictment alleges that Xuzhou added the melamine to artificially boost the protein content of the gluten to meet the requirements specified in Suzhou's contract with ChemNutra.

Wood said adding the melamine, which would allow it to pass chemical inspections for protein content, was cheaper than actually adding protein to the gluten.

UPDATE: The more I thought about that sentence in red above, the more I wondered how far-reaching this ChemNutra company's sales might be. Menu Foods buys wheat gluten from ChemNutra. The following brands are just some of the ones sold by Menu Foods. (Who by the way is suing ChemNutra.)

• America's Choice
• Companion
• Co-Op Gold
• Drs Foster & Smith
• Food Lion
• Giant Companion
• Hill Country Fare
• Nutro
• Sophistacat
• Wegmans

I am shocked, shocked I tell you, to hear there's corruption in the Bush Administration

Yes, to paraphrase Capt. Renault in Casablanca, I know it's shocking. But apparently top level officials in the Bush Administration have accepted gifts from members of the very industry they are charged with regulating!

From today's Washington Post:

The chief of the Consumer Product Safety Commission and her predecessor have taken dozens of trips at the expense of the toy, appliance and children's furniture industries and others they regulate, according to internal records obtained by The Washington Post. Some of the trips were sponsored by lobbying groups and lawyers representing the makers of products linked to consumer hazards.

The records document nearly 30 trips since 2002 by the agency's acting chairman, Nancy Nord, and the previous chairman, Hal Stratton, that were paid for in full or in part by trade associations or manufacturers of products ranging from space heaters to disinfectants. The airfares, hotels and meals totaled nearly $60,000, and the destinations included China, Spain, San Francisco, New Orleans and a golf resort on Hilton Head Island, S.C.

The agency's travel patterns during the Bush administration, detailed in internal agency documents, differ from those of the Clinton era. Ann Brown, who served as chairman from 1994 to 2001, traveled only at the expense of the agency or of media organizations that sponsored appearances where she announced product recalls, according to the documents provided.

"We hated to have an industry pay for our staff for anything," said Pam Gilbert, a lawyer who was executive director of the agency under Brown.

You can read the entire article here.

Are Sara Lee and others gouging the military?

Sara Lee (she of the size 14 carbon footprint), Perdue, ConAgra are being investigated by the US Justice Department for potentially overcharging the military as a part of deals made by their consultants — who are former military procurement officers.

According to a story in the Wall Street Journal,

Investigators from the Justice Department and the Defense Department are looking into deals that Perdue Farms Inc., Sara Lee Corp., ConAgra Foods Inc. and other U.S. companies made to supply the military, according to people involved in the inquiry. The companies made the deals with the help of former U.S. military procurement officials they hired as consultants or executives.

The inquiry is focused on whether the food companies set excessively high prices when they sold their goods to the Army's primary food contractor for the war zone, a Kuwaiti firm called Public Warehousing Co. A related question is whether Public Warehousing improperly pocketed for itself refunds it received from these suppliers. Public Warehousing bought vast amounts of meat, vegetables and bakery items from the food companies, and delivered them to U.S. troops.

Read more here.