Jalisco Cheese Chief Enters No-Contest Plea
The president and principal owner of Jalisco Mexican Products Inc., Gary McPherson, pleaded no contest today to 10 criminal counts stemming from last year’s tainted cheese epidemic that killed as many as 40 people, largely in the Los Angeles area.
Under a plea-bargain with the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, McPherson will serve no more than six months in county jail, according to a spokesman for the prosecutor.
McPherson entered the no-contest pleas, tantamount to guilty pleas in a criminal case, in Los Cerritos Municipal Court in Bellflower. Sentencing was set for June 4.
Nine of the counts were linked to charges of manufacturing and selling adulterated food, and one stemmed from a charge of operating an unsanitary food-processing establishment.
Originally, McPherson faced more than 50 criminal charges in connection with the epidemic, which was traced to bacteria in the soft Mexican-style cheese produced by his now-closed Artesia processing plant.
On March 28, Jose Luis Medina, a Jalisco vice president and its chief cheese maker, pleaded no contest to 12 misdemeanor counts as part of a plea-bargain. His sentencing is set for May 20 in the same court.
Scientific experts could never agree on precisely how the epidemic began, a fact that precluded bringing felony charges in the case, prosecutors said.
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