Redland fresh-produce importer Fresh King used fake importers, false invoices and rigged lab tests to evade a pesticide alert on imported peas, according to a recently revealed federal grand-jury indictment.
And when those alleged attempts to circumvent food safety laws failed, Fresh King's principals -- Denisse Serge and Peter Schnebly -- had a fall-back plan, according to details of the indictment.
According to the 13-count indictment, Fresh King stored crates of rotting peas, yams and squash in its warehouse and presented them to U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspectors for destruction, instead of turning over the suspect produce.
The company had already sold Guatemalan snow peas and sugar snap peas potentially containing traces of methamidophos and chlorothalonil to its clients.
Serge and Schnebly also own Schnebly Redland's Winery, a high-profile tropical fruit winery that is central to drawing agro-tourism to Homestead and the Redland-- a nascent effort to repeat the success of winery spots in Napa Valley and upstate New York.
Serge, Schnebly and Fresh King warehouse manager Rebecca Bazan all voluntarily surrendered and were arraigned Monday before Magistrate Judge Stephen T. Brown in U.S. District Court.
''Serge has entered a plea of not guilty, and she has requested a trial by jury,'' said her attorney, Juan Vargas, who was echoed by Schnebly's attorney, Alex Angueira. Silvia Pinera-Vasquez, who represents Bazan, said her client was a Fresh King employee for many years. ''She is without knowledge if anything occurred,'' Pinera-Vasquez said.
The case covers the years 2000 to 2004. In the 1990s, the Food and Drug Administration required all snow peas and sugar snap peas imported from Guatemala to be held until the importing company could prove that the produce was free of banned pesticides. Most of these Guatemalan vegetables shipped to the Unitdd States enter through South Florida.
To circumvent those rules, the defendants found a compliant laboratory to test rigged samples, the indictment said. Even before the rigged results were available, the produce was sold to Fresh King customers, it was charged. There were no claims in the indictment that those sales caused physical harm to the public.
When the tests detected pesticides, the indictment said, Fresh King would supply decomposing vegetables for destruction, claiming that this included the full shipment of snow peas and sugar snap peas.
After federal authorities searched Fresh King in 2003, the company turned to fake importers or labeled the vegetables to be immediately re-exported to avoid inspection and detection, the indictment said. The South Florida participants in the scheme collaborated with grower-shippers from Guatemala, according to the charges. Three Guatemalan grower-shippers were also indicted.
The indictment did not say how the purported scheme was detected, and the U.S. attorney's office declined to comment on that.
Mary Bottari, director of the Harmonization Project at Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, said voluntary food safety testing was ''totally subject to abuse'' because there were no accreditation standards for the labs and no requirement that the results be sent to the FDA.
''The issue of how these folks can currently buy their own laboratory is one of the single most important things being discussed on Capitol Hill with regards to food safety,'' Bottari said.
If convicted, Serge and Schnebly could face up to 155 years in prison in the 13-count indictment on charges of conspiracy, false statements and smuggling goods. Bazan could face 20 years on charges of conspiracy, false statements and obstruction of justice.
Jose Eduardo Campos, an employee of a cold-storage and logistics company, was charged with five counts of conspiracy and false statements, charges that carry up to 25 years in prison. Campos could not be located.
