Taking the fifth, repeatedly, is what Stewart Parnell did yesterday when he testified before congress over the salmonella in peanuts thing. The head of Peanut Corporation of America twiddled his fingers on the table and stared stonily throughout the entire grilling. I know because I watched it.
The recent salmonella scare that prompted a recall of 1900 peanut products has caused over 600 people to become sick and is suspected in 9 deaths in the U.S. As early as 2006, this guy KNEW the peanuts were contaminated but he didn't care. He told his employees that he wasn't about to lose any money over this and to ship the stuff out. So these contaminated peanuts went out of 50 manufacturers of cookies, crackers, and ice cream. He apparently felt no remorse saying this salmonella stuff was "costing us huge $$$$". The cookies, candy, crackers and granola bars were sh
ipped to schools, stores and nursing homes. During testimony, the son of a 72 year old woman spoke about the death of his mother. She was a nursing home resident who was recovering from cancer treatment when her daughter gave her a peanut butter sandwich. The poor lady DIED...not from cancer but from peanut butter.This is the most disgusting thing ever! How many of us have sent our kids to school with lunchboxes packed with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches? This is one of our most basic food items and I suspect most of us have a jar of peanut butter in our pantry.
During the testimony before congress, emails were read where this guy griped and complained about lost money and how he didn't care if he had to scrape peanuts off his floor, he was SELLING THEM. What a huge creep! The FBI is currently investigating Stewart Parnell and his company. I hope if he's as guilty as he seems, they nail his ass.
In one of the most interesting moments of the hearing, a congressman held up a big clear plastic jar filled with products that included peanuts from his company. He was asked...would you, Mr. Parnell, eat any of the food in this jar? Mr. Parnell stared stonily and said...I take the fifth.
16 comments:
Brilliant, Regina!
I say, nail his balls to the wall!
My mother's favortie thing to make is peanut butter cookies, and one day my son asked her to combine all of his favorite cookies into one. So, my mother like any loving grandmother trying to please a grandchild made Peanut butter, oatmeal, chocolate chip cookies. They were fabulous!
Also, one of our favorite late night snacks is a PBJ. My son and I would be up late watching a movie or Comedy Central and one of us would say to the other, "PBJ me."
It's very sad to hear that this man won't take responsibility for his greedy actions, which caused serious injury to many people and even death to some.
From Peanut Butter.
How impossible is that to fathom?
Anyone who knowingly offers something that is dangerous to others for his own gain should pay for it in prison time. No paying out money and going on with life...pay reparations THEN go to jail, as well...and not just white collar prison...real jail. His actions caused deaths. That is not a white-collar crime, in my book.
There is no excuse for that. Even if he stated he would have lost his company over it, there is no excuse. He offered a product he knew would make people sick. By definition, that means he knew it could kill someone with a weak constitution.
Brenna
More than likely this man will loose everything he has in civil lawsuits and spend some time in jail. However, none of that really makes up for the loss of a loved one. It's sad one of his employees didn't step up and report him sooner. And, why exactly was one of the plants never inspected? Greed! Greed! Greed! As a business owner, you have to be responsible, even if it costs you money.
OK, so feed him a fifth of the jar!! LOL!!
Parnell . . . what a great name for a villain.
:D
G.
Someone mentioned to me that those responsible for sending out the contaminated milk in China were sentenced to death. We won't go that far here but the FBI is doing a criminal investigation. This man will do jail time I think. His greed will cost him everything. Unfortunately it doesn't make up for the lives lost.
Know what's so damn scary??? HOw many of us send our kids to school with PB&J?? Millions of us. This is some scary shit.
Pansy ass creep! Greed kills people doesn't it?
On another note as a follow up to your blog on the octuplet's mom, I read today that she had been drawing $490 a month in food stamps for the first six, which is now going to increase with the additional eight. Not to mention the disability benefits she was drawing. Medicaid is paying for the hospitalization of the octuplets to the tune of who knows what. They will be there about twelve weeks total.
Now she has set up a website requesting donations. Can you hear me ranting?????? lol
Ahhhh Tess! I've been reading about this too and just SEETHING!!! And this doctor needs to be drummed out of business. I'm seeing more and more fertility doctors come out and talk about how horribly unethical he was. Did you see the pics of the house? A simple three bedroom house with wall to wall baby cribs, food on the frickin walls and messes everywhere. And this is with SIX kids. Add 8 to the mix! Damn. Heard child protective services is now investigating this situation.
I'll be blogging about this tomorrow at my own blog. http://www.reginacarlysle.blogspot.com
I hope everyone will come by and check out my RANT.
All of this makes me SO glad that I either buy organic peanut butter or get it ground and fresh myself, both from Whole Foods. The more food scares I see, the more I wonder what crap people are eating that they don't know about. Scary shit.
It's beginning to make more and more sense to go to organic things and preparing our own stuff. You just have to wonder how lax the FDA is to let things like this make it into the public.
What a dick! OMG, I hope he does jail time, this is just insane! My blood boils when I hear about stuff like this!
How sad. People shouldn't be allowed to get away with stuff like that. I hope he gets jail time.
I actually believe he will. He seemed so unrepentant, just sorry he got caught.
*sigh*
It's sad that they knew it was tainted but sold it anyways.
That happened in China with the tainted milk killing all those babies. Those heads that knew they were serving tainted milk received the death sentence.
Why does it seem like everytime I turn around some food product is being recalled.
It's getting to the point where I'm getting worried about what I eat because of being pregnant. Not even veggies are safe, I remember that tainted lettuce scare a couple of years ago.
*sigh*
I honestly believe the FDA needs to be larger. They must hire more people. And you're right Amy, it's so scary we're not even certain our veggies are safe. Pretty soon we'll be growing our own gardens just to make sure.
Post a Comment