Coop repacking, selling expired food items busted in Laguna

SAN PEDRO CITY, Laguna—A businessman running a cooperative that supposedly repacked and sold expired goods to several supermarkets in this city was arrested on Thursday, police said on Friday.

Supt. Harold Depositar, city police chief, said a raid on a warehouse of the First Laguna Organics Marketing Corp., run by Rio Cañeda, yielded more than 1,000 bottles of sandwich spread, mayonnaise, cheese, and other food products which authorities believed were already expired but which the company had repacked under new labels for reselling.

The raiding team, composed of personnel of the city police, Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, and Food and Drug Administration (FDA), also found packs of sugar, flour and bottles of oil and pickles “swarmed with maggots” in a bungalow turned warehouse in Barangay (village) San Antonio.

Judge Agripino Morga of the Regional Trial Court Branches 29 to 32 in San Pablo City, Laguna province, issued the search warrant in relation to violations of the Food and Drug Administration Act of 2009 (Republic Act No. 9711).

“There were too many that the inventory (of the seized products) lasted until (Thursday) night. The place was also very dirty,” Depositar said in a telephone interview.

He said authorities learned about Cañeda’s activity from his employees who sought out the FDA weeks ago after the suspect failed to pay them their wages.

A website and a Facebook page described the company as a cooperative engaged in the repacking and distribution of household goods, but Depositar said they found no records of the company in any government registration./rga