DISEASED MEAT.

Otago Witness, Issue 3861, 13 March 1928, Page 82

DISEASED MEAT.

MEAT SALESMEN FINED.

SHOULDER OF AUSTRALIAN MUTTON. . (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, February 10. An unusual case came before Air H. C. A. Bingley, the Alarylebone magistrate, when the well-known meat salesmen, Eastmans, Ltd., were charged with exposing for sale, on their premis<Z3 in Harrow road, a shoulder of mutton which was unsound and unwholesome or unfit for the food of man. Air C. V. Hill, the solicitor prosecuting for the Paddington Borough Council, said the shoulder of mutton was exposed for sale at the shop with a number of others. It attracted the attention of the council’s inspector, Air Pallet, who on examination found it diseased. The joint was exposed for sale at per lb. Mr Hindle, the solicitor defending, urged that the sheep came from Australia, where the greatest precautions were_ taken to see that the meat was sound before it was exported. It was almost unheard of, he said, for an animal to be in the state described. Mr Bingley: I should dearly like to know what happened to the rest of the carcass. ’ Mr Hindle (after consultation with one of the company’s officials) said he was not in a position to call anyone to answer the question. Air Bingley said the council’s inspector, though he found the joint unfit, for some extraordinary reason was extremely reticent. It was obviously the inspector’s duty to inquire for the carcass from which the joint had been cut, but be did not do so. What he did, he said, was to ring up later, when perhaps his conscience pricked him or some superior officer had reminded him, and he was then given to understand that this was an isolated joint and that the carcass was not there. He (Air Bingley) had asked the defendant company what had become of the rest of the carcass, and he could only assume from its answer that, although-’ it was unfit for human consumption, it was sold to some wretched people. That was not a pleasant thing to think of. The Alagistrate added that he regarded the Act under which the proceedings were taken as a most salutary one, and while he accepted the statement that the defendants were the last people to wish to do such a thing, it was a very unfortunate thing to have happened. He was limited to a penalty of £5O, or six months’ imprisonment, with or without hard labour. He could not, however, commit a limited company to prison, even if he wished to do so.

Tn addition to the fine of £25, the defendant company was ordered to pay £5 5s costs.