One of the co-owners of a Northern California slaughterhouse at the centre of a recall for selling adulterated meat has pleaded guilty to a federal criminal charge.
Executives at the plant in Petaluma are accused of processing cows with cancer while US livestock inspectors took lunch breaks.
Robert Singleton, who co-owns Rancho Feeding Corp, which has now be closed down, entered his guilty plea in a San Francisco court on Friday to aiding and abetting in the distribution of adulterated, misbranded and uninspected meat, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Singleton, aged 77, is on $50,000 bail and has signed an agreement requiring him to work with prosecutors who have filed charges against the company’s other owner, Jesse Amaral Jr., and two employees, Eugene Corda and Felix Cabrera, who have all pleaded not guilty.
