The Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) is now a defunct peanut-processing company that was founded in 1977 and based in Lynchburg, Virginia. After a substantial outbreak of salmonella in the US in 2008 and 2009 the company was forced out of business.
PCA had processing plants in Georgia; Virginia; and Texas. They mainly provided peanut products to institutions such as prisons, schools and nursing homes. They also sold peanuts to food processors who used the peanuts in such things as cookies, ice cream, and other edible products.
PCA had a long history of food quality problems in the 90’s, they were sued by the American Candy Company after it was discovered by the FDA that their peanut butter had surpassed the FDA’s tolerance level for aflatoxin a toxic mold. American Candy had already processed the peanut butter into 8,000 cases of “kisses” that could not be shipped to the intended customer Wal-Mart. PCA was sued again in 1991 by Zachary Confections when 40,020 pounds of nuts had unacceptable levels of aflatoxin. Concerns regarding PCA’s sanitation standards had gone back to the mid-1980’s.
Late in 2008 and the beginning of 2009 nine people and 714 people from 46 states, half of those children became ill from food poisoning due to eating foods that had been tainted with peanuts this according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Test done by Food and Drug Administration and the CDC confirmed that outbreak source and the sickness people were experiencing from the salmonella was from peanuts produced by PCA in its Georgia facility.
Food and Drug Administration inspectors testified, after a two-week examination of the Georgia facility in 2009 that PCA knew that its peanut-butter goods were contaminated with salmonella but distributed them anyway after "re-testing" them and deeming them alright to send out. This happened at a minimum of 12 times in 2007 and 2008.
In Feb 2009 the FDA stated that PCA distributed contaminated peanuts products under the following: (1) without retesting, (2) before the re-test results came back from an outside testing facility, and (3) after the second test showed no bacterial contamination. In all three cases, the original positive results means that the product should have been thrown away.
Due to this massive outbreak of salmonella and a large investigation of all of PCA’s plants Stewart Parnell, who at one time owned and ran PCA was sentenced this week to 28 years in prison along with his brother, Michael Parnell. The brothers were found guilty by a federal jury on numerous counts of conspiracy, mail and wire fraud and the sale of misbranded food.
Parnell admitted issues at his facility, but did not talk about the emails and company reports that disclosed Parnell consciously distributed salmonella- contaminated peanut butter and falsified lab reports. In one striking email conversation, when Parnell was informed that a load was late because the results of salmonella testing weren’t back yet, he replied back, “Just ship it”
PCA had a social responsibility to its consumers to insure that its product was safe instead greed and earning a dollar was more important than insuring people’s lives. In the end people lost their lives others have to live with irreversible damage from the salmonella poisonings and a company as well as is employees are all out of a job.