Meat meant for pet food 'supplied to restaurants'

Hundreds of tonnes of pet food was sold as meat fit for human consumption, causing a massive public health risk, a court was told yesterday.

Hundreds of tonnes of pet food was sold as meat fit for human consumption, causing a massive public health risk, a court was told yesterday.

A sophisticated distribution network generated profits running into millions of pounds by selling the heavily disguised pet food to butchers, market traders, restaurants, take-aways and supermarkets.

"The risk to public health from food poisoning organisms has been unquantifiable," said Ben Nolan QC, for the prosecution, at Hull Crown Court. "The main fraud alleged here is a fraud on the consumer.

"It was operated over a period of about three years between 1993 and 1996. It had serious food safety implications. The Crown allege that the defendants devised and operated a system for selling meat - in the main poultry meat - as wholesome and edible when in truth it was condemned meat which was fit only for pet food."

Seven people deny conspiracy to defraud businesses by selling poultry meat not fit for human consumption. They are: Clive Boid, of Oldcotes, near Worksop, Nottinghamshire; his son Andrew Boid, of Carlton in Lindrick, near Worksop; Darren Bibby, of Oldcotes; Peter Tantram, and his wife, Louise, of Ingham, Lincolnshire; Kevin Wilson, of Cleethorpes, Humberside; and Timothy Powell, of Hove, East Sussex.

The jury was told that pet food is a by-product of the food industry, which condemns a percentage of its meat as unfit for humans. "Once poultry is condemned, it can never lawfully be received back into the edible food chain," Mr Nolan said.

The jury was told that Clive and Andrew Boid, with Mr Bibby, were bosses at a company in Newark called Wells By-Products Ltd, which processed poultry meat for pet food. Its main customers were Spillers and Pedigree.

The court was told that Wells bought huge quantities of condemned poultry, which was packaged as pet food and invoiced to a company in Lincoln called Cliff Top Pet Foods.

Cliff Top - which was run by Mr and Mrs Tantram - cleaned up the meat before it was passed on to a man called John McGinty, who is not on trial.

Mr Nolan said Mr McGinty helped to change the product's identity from pet food to food and it was moved on again.

The jury was told that Mr Wilson and Mr Powell, both food brokers, then helped to sell the food on.

Mr Nolan said: "It is the Crown's case that Wilson and Powell knew full well the true origin of the product and therefore they were defrauding innocent purchasers, be they wholesalers, dealers and further down the line, retailers and consumers."

The jury was told the investigation that led to the case coming to court began in late 1995 when environmental health officers became suspicious about the source of poultry being sold by butchers in the Rotherham area. The investigation was taken over by South Yorkshire Police in 1998.

"The total amount of documentation obtained in this case now fills a large storeroom," Mr Nolan said. The trial is expected to take four months.