Raw milk cheese maker pleads guilty to Listeria outbreak that killed 2

A former raw-milk cheese maker and his company pleaded guilty Tuesday in connection with a listeria outbreak between 2016 and 2017 that killed two people and hospitalized six others, prosecutors said.

The man, Johannes Vulto, and the Vulto Creamery company have each pleaded guilty to one felony count of causing the introduction of adulterated food into interstate commerce, the Justice Department said. in a statement.

As part of the plea deal before Judge Thérèse Wiley Dancks in Syracuse, N.Y., Mr. Vulto was ordered to pay $100,000, according to court documents. He will be sentenced on July 9 and could face up to a year in prison, a $250,000 fine and a year of supervised release, according to court documents.

Mr. Vulto, 64, opened his dairy in Walton, N.Y., in 2012 to make and sell cheese from unpasteurized milk, court documents show. His products, including an artisanal cheese called Ouleout, became popular in part because of their taste, but also because of Mr. Vulto’s compelling story: He moved to the United States from the Netherlands in 1990 and had been an artist-in-residence at an institution affiliated with at the Museum of Modern Art in New York before turning to making cheese from his Brooklyn apartment.

But customers became sick after eating the company’s cheeses. The first cases were reported in September 2016.

Mr. Vulto closed his business in March 2017 after the Food and Drug Administration linked cheese from the creamery to a listeria outbreak, prompting the agency to issue an order. to remind of its products, prosecutors said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found eight people had been hospitalized in the outbreak linked to the company. Of the eight people who were sick, two had died, According to the CDC.

Between July 2014 and February 2017, Mr. Vulto had swabbed parts of his facility and sent the samples to labs to be tested for listeria, according to the plea agreement. Mr. Vulto took swabs on at least 20 different occasions during that period, 18 of which turned out to be positive for listeria, according to court documents.

Listeria does not cause serious illness in most people, but certain high-risk individuals may be especially vulnerable, according to the CDC. According to the CDC, approximately 260 people die each year in the United States from listeria infections. According to the CDC, infection can cause fever, diarrhea, vomiting and flu-like symptoms

Carla B. Freedman, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York, said in a statement that the investigation and prosecution held Mr. Vulto and his company responsible after they “caused illness and death to consumers in a completely preventable tragedy .”

A lawyer for Mr. Vulto did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.

The Food and Drug Administration, which investigated the outbreak, declined to comment further Tuesday, citing ongoing litigation.

Criminal charges for adulterated food products are not filed regularly, but they do occur. In 2016, two cheese companies and a cheese company executive pleaded guilty to conspiring to sell adulterated and misbranded cheese. according to the Ministry of Justice. In that case no one had become ill.

Fernando McMillan, a special agent in the FDA’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation, said in a statement that consumers rely on the agency to “ensure their food is safe and wholesome.”

“When companies and individuals place themselves above the law by producing food that endangers and harms the public, as happened in this case,” he said, “we will ensure they are brought to justice.”