Armed Cops Raid Health Food Store in Raw Milk Crackdown (VIDEO)

3 arrested in "swat-style" raw dairy bust.
Armed Cops Raid Health Food Store in Raw Milk Crackdown (VIDEO)
Agents tried to explain the raid to angry neighbors and supporters.

After a year-long undercover investigation, law enforcement agents and federal health officials descended on a popular Los Angeles health food store in an early morning armed raid and arrested the owner on conspiracy charges.

His crime? Selling raw dairy products. 

James Stewart, the owner of the popular Rawesome Foods store in Venice, California, was charged with conspiring to unlawfully produce and sell unpasteurized dairy products. 

At the same time law enforcement was carrying out a "multi-agency SWAT-style armed raid" at the Venice store, authorities were also descending on Healthy Family Farms in Ventura County, north of L.A. They arrested Sharon Palmer, the owner of the farm, which was the sole supplier of raw dairy products to Rawsome Foods. Eugenie Bloch, a farm employee, was also arrested. 

Rawesome and Healthy Family Farms were both featured in the documentary Farmageddon, which we told you about last month. 

According to the LA Weekly, the arrests stem from the sale of raw goat milk to an undercover agent from a cooler in the back of a van in a grocery store parking lot. Elina Shatkin writes:

While it's legal to manufacture and sell unpasteurized dairy products in California, licenses and permits are required. Rawesome may have violated regulations by selling raw dairy products to non-members.

The Weekly has a lot of details on the raids. Protests have been planned outside the courthouse today. 

And Venice locals are, understandably, pissed. We've got video of the raid, after the jump:

Comments

6
Oh, and meat glue people, this government's regulations for the food we consume is a disgrace; and it seems no one really oversees what actually goes on. If someone really cared about our children, as well as what everyone else consumes, most of the junk on the grocery shelves wouldn't be there; neither would there be some of the practices taking place with the food that is produced! I'm almost positive that the people in the food industry, do not consume what they put out there; for the masses in this country!
SusyQuick, thank you for your comment. There is far too much government intervention for nothing. And it's a joke about what they do oversee and what they allow to go on, for our health and benefit; I think not. There is far too much that they allow to go on and do not oversee, like the conditions of egg farmers and the filthy and rotten conditions hens live under while hatching their eggs riddled with chemicals and antibiotics; in metal cages crowded for their whole life. If you have viewed FOOD INC., you already know what it is all about.
Pardon me, I was wrong, it is a Health Food Store, but I stand behind everything else I said. Thank you
Now isn't that interesting, that they "RAID" a raw dairy farmer, but it's quite all right to sell GMO foods without labels, spray the heck out of produce that is dangerous to everyone's health; but they're not doing anything about those issues. That is okay I guess, well it's not okay with me; and many of us! This is sooo backward and negligent, along with inconsistent; with the way the food industry is. They don't protect our health, they just want to interrupt someone's livelihood; even if it means it isn't all that bad. They pick and choose according to the USDA and perhaps the FDA, what they're going to attack next. But they are not doing a good and consistent job of it.
i have sent the following email to the appropriate party (the DA). please feel free to copy-paste and send yourself: sandi@da.lacounty.gov : Dear Ms. Sandi, After having read that popular Los Angeles health food store food store was raided because the proprietors were selling raw milk, I felt prompted to express my dismay. Many people stand by scientific research which is not FDA-supported. And this makes perfect sense since the FDA fetters out chemical laden foodstuffs while making it near impossible for local, organic farmers to produce what people want—and need. Supporting sustainable agriculture and consumer integrity is what the people want—not wasted tax dollars on SWAT team style-raids for—raw milk. Please consider revising the licensing regulations for the sake of your own community. Please be a stand-up individual and set a democratic example for the rest of the country. And please stop wasting tax dollars on absolute nonsense. You are inadvertently supporting large corporations that want nothing more than to keep one hand on American wallets and another (choking grip) on America’s economic pulse. If people want to drink milk, by god, let them drink it as they will. We are tired of having a limited say about what goes into our bodies as well as that of our children. There is much implied, much unsaid and little text to support many of my claims, but I am certain that your personal knowledge of the said statements as well as your own conscious will make way for some serious decision-making that support the needs of the consumers who are willing and anxious to spend their hard-earned dollars foodstuffs of their personal choice. While some people prefer to support a commercial and toxic food industry (for lack of dependable information), others are seeing the light of day. And this will continue to be the case. I recommend that you take a proactive stance that gives a voice to the people and supports American democracy. Enough is enough.
Let's see - it's okay to continue selling salmonella-laced ground meat in national grocery stores, but raw milk products rate a swat team? Hmmmm....