Check the fridge, Texans, and make sure you don’t have any Lucerne or Albertson eggs with the dates and lots enumerated in this U.S. Food & Drug Administration recall notice, because people have been getting Salmonella poisoning from eating them. The eggs were sold to a bunch of national food wholesalers and have spread nationwide.
The recall just started a day or two ago, so the media hasn’t yet noted that the corporation responsible for the tainted food, Wright County Egg of Galt, Iowa, is operated by the effervescent DeCoster family, my very favorite egg tycoons.
This yolk empire is headed by Austin “Jack” DeCoster, who was spotted hanging out in June at the Androscoggin County (Maine) district attorney’s office while Maine Contract Farming, previously named DeCoster Egg Farm, entered a guilty plea through its attorney to what was billed as the biggest (dollar-wise) settlement in America over charges of cruelty to farm animals.
DeCoster’s Wright County Egg operation has repeatedly been raided for employing illegal immigrants, including a raid in June 2006 in which 36 people were arrested.
In September of 2002, DeCoster Farms agreed to a settlement of more than $1.5 million in a lawsuit by several women who were working at the company’s Wright County egg plants and alleged sexual harassment, rape, abuse and retaliation by supervisors for the company.
And in June 2000, then-Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller said Austin “Jack” DeCoster would be classified as a “habitual violator” of the state’s environmental laws and assessed a civil penalty of $150,000.
So, you know, if you find yourself hugging the porcelain convenience after ingesting a couple of Wright County’s Finest Breakfast Tacos, you can thank your lucky stars that at least you were poisoned by a professional pirate, and not some rank amateur.
