ALBANY, Ga. (AP) – A jury weighing criminal charges Thursday against the owner of a Georgia peanut plant blamed for a nationwide salmonella outbreak five years ago will decide the case without hearing one fact – that nine people died after eating the company’s tainted peanut butter.
Former Peanut Corporation of America owner Stewart Parnell and two co-defendants have been on trial since Aug. 1 and the jury started deliberations last Friday. Parnell and his brother, food broker Michael Parnell, are charged with knowingly shipping contaminated peanut butter to customers and faking lab tests intended to screen for salmonella.
Tainted peanut butter from the company’s plant in rural Blakely, Georgia, ended up in jars, packaged crackers and other snacks. In 2009, hundreds of people were sickened and the outbreak led to one of the largest food recalls in U.S. history.
The peanut plant’s quality control manager, Mary Wilkerson, is charged along with Stewart Parnell with obstructing justice. Jury deliberations were to resume in U.S. District Court after a three-day recess. Experts say it is the first time food processors have been tried in a federal food-poisoning case.
Prosecutors spent nearly six weeks presenting the jury with 46 witnesses and an estimated 1,000 documents. Testimony included that people got sick, but attorneys and witnesses never mentioned that some died.