The owner and the manager of a Netherlands egg farm were both convicted of knowingly selling eggs contaminated with Salmonella, according to NL Times.
The prosecution sprang from guests at an event in 2017 falling ill, with one eventually dying, after consuming the contaminated eggs.
The eggs were purchased from a supermarket in Germany and were sourced back to the poultry farm in Wouterswoude in the Netherlands. All eight people that became sick were confirmed to having consumed the contaminated eggs.
Company Director Bertus V. and Manager Sije van der V. have been sentenced to six months in prison and 200 hours of community service each. The men were not charged for the one death that occurred.
According to Food Safety News, the producer was fined €80,000 (US$86,000), which was lower than the €140,000 (US$150,400) requested by the Public Prosecution Service, due to the amount of time that had passed since the incident.
A repeat offense?
Following investigations, the strain of Salmonella that led to illness was also found at the egg producer’s Wouterswoude facility.
However, during the hearing, the Public Prosecution Service found that the Dutch Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA) was unaware of the contamination findings by the laboratory who tests the producer’s samples because the positive samples were concealed.
Documentation from the producer showed that it asked the laboratory to not report infections to the NVWA, but Van der V. denied concealing the contamination incident. Bertus V. claimed he did not keep track of the infections at his company's locations and both men stated they were not aware of the positive samples.
The court believes the pair must have known about the contamination due to a similar contamination incident that happened in July 2016 at the same facility, which no corrective actions were taken.
