Sobelco boss arrested over use-by-date fraud

28 July 2005

BRUSSELS — The director of Sobelco has been arrested in Charleroi on allegations his company sold over date food on the Belgian market for five years.

Ferdinando Leone, of Marcinelle, was arrested on Thursday and officially charged with forgery and fraud, newspaper ‘Het Gazet van Antwerpen’ reported.

An arrest warrant was issued after customs and excise officers raided the Sobelco warehouse in Jumet on 14 July. The raid was made public on Monday.

In that raid, 100 tons of out-of-date food was seized. Some of the food dated back to 1999 and included pasta, sauces, canned vegetables, biscuits and alcoholic drinks.

Two employees of the company were also arrested, while equipment and company accounts were seized.

The Belgian Food Agency urged all shops and supermarkets to remove Sobelco products from their market shelves immediately.

However, it identified on Wednesday 18 products in which the use-by-date had been changed and urged consumers to avoid these products.

The agency withdrew its warning to remove all Sobelco products from shop shelves, but the companies that were supplied by Sobelco have not been identified.

Subject: Belgian news