A factory worker has been jailed for more than three years after he admitted to tampering with food products used in high street restaurants including Nando’s.
Garry Jones, 38, worked for Harvey & Brockless Fine Food Company, a manufacturing firm based in Evesham in Worcestershire, that produces large quantities of items for restaurants across the country.
Jones had pleaded guilty to contaminating goods that are supplied to restaurants including hummus served at Nando’s. No contaminated products were consumed by customers.
He worked as a ‘picker’ on the late shift, whose responsibility was to collect all of the required ingredients for the next day’s cooking.
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CCTV cameras inside the factory showed him deliberately tampering with tubs of hummus and salad dressings when he was alone.
Evidence showed Jones contaminated dozens of products with items including rubber gloves, plastic bags and metal ring pulls.
Footage also showed him mixing an unknown substance into raw ingredients that were to be prepared for production the following day.
Mehree Kamranfar, Senior Crown Prosecutor for CPS West Midlands, said: “This was an extremely disturbing case that could have had far-reaching implications had the defendant not been caught.
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“Jones knowingly and maliciously contaminated food products that were going to be distributed to some of the most popular high street restaurants across the country.
“The cross-contamination caused alarm both within the company and externally, as Jones’s utter disregard, particularly in mixing fish sauce with raw ingredients, could have threatened serious harm to those with allergies.
“In addition, sabotaging the food products supplied by Harvey & Brockless not only cost the firm thousands of pounds, it also threatened to destroy the company’s reputation.
“When faced with the overwhelming evidence presented by the prosecution team Jones pleaded guilty to both charges. I want to thank West Midlands Police and the prosecution team for building the strongest possible case, which saw him convicted and today sentenced.”
It comes after Morrisons issued a product recall after it was found to contain salmonella.
The shopping chain told buyers that they should not eat their Morrisons Spanish Chorizo Ring (200g, best before Dec 8 2023).
The recall affects the items sold in England, Scotland and Wales only.
Symptoms of salmonella include sickness, fever, diarrhoea, chills and headaches.
Morrisons stated: “As a precautionary measure, Morrisons is recalling the above date code of this product as there is a risk it may contain salmonella.
“Please do not eat this product and return it to your nearest store for a full refund.
“We don’t need a receipt. No other products are affected by this issue.
“We apologise for the inconvenience this may cause and assure customers of our continuing commitment to the highest standard of product quality and safety.”
Nick Martin, managing director of Harvey & Brockless, said: “It gives no-one at the company any pleasure that Garry Jones, our former colleague, has been sentenced to serve time in prison.
“However, we feel it is important that people realise that any such criminal actions will be punished, and for that reason we welcome the sentence he received.
“This disturbing episode could have had awful consequences if Harvey & Brockless had not had such robust quality assurance and product recall procedures in place.
“While everyone at the company was shocked and appalled at what happened, we were also reassured at how our quick response meant that no contaminated products ever reached any end consumers."
