Gourmet Express Marketing, an Addison, Illinois, food distributor, has settled federal civil and criminal cases brought against it for mislabeling fish products and overstating the weight of shrimp.
The firm's owner, Patrick Bruno, agreed to plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge in a criminal lawsuit against him, in effect admitting to mislabeling fish to fetch a higher price between 2007 and 2010, according to a news release from the US Attorney's Office in Chicago.
Bruno and his business were charged with sold swai as "catfish" and perch as "red snapper" or "pacific snapper," something that came to light when the Food and Drug Administration tested DNA samples to determine the species of fish. They were also accused of packing shrimp in an ice glaze that added to its weight. When the FDA compared the labeled weight to the cooked weight in 2009 and 2010, it was respectively 21.5% and 14.4% under the labeled weight.
