Four face charges over 55 tons of bad cheese

Four people are facing federal conspiracy charges after investigators claim they tried to sell 110,000 pounds of cheese containing salmonella, E. coli and other illness-causing bacteria through a facility in Elmhurst.

Prosecutors noted there were no instances where the 55 tons of spoiled cheese were determined to have caused any illnesses despite being sold under the brand name of Queso Cincho de Guerrero in stores in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Georgia and Texas in 2007. The four are accused of lying to federal inspectors and sending false documents to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to cover up contaminated cheese being “washed” by scraping off mold and fungus, then repackaged.

Guadalupe Zurita, 42, of Mexico, is accused of operating a distribution company in Illinois that imported the cheese from Mexico.

Miguel Leal, 47, of Monroe, Wis., was president of a Wisconsin-based company that operated a distribution facility in Elmhurst.

According to the indictment, Zurita’s company shipped 110,986 pounds of dried Mexican cheese over three months in 2007. Despite the federal government placing a hold on the shipments, court papers allege 311 cartons were illegally distributed to retailers. Prosecutors said two other defendants, Baldemar Zurita, 39, of Chicago, and Cynthia Gutierrez, 37, of Cicero, “falsely told” an inspector the 311 cartons were not sold, but rather sent to Leal’s plant in Wisconsin.

Government inspectors later ordered that all the cheese be destroyed, but the indictment alleges the four sold the bad cheese to retailers anyway.

Leal and Baldemar Zurita are facing a maximum of five years in prison if convicted. Gutierrez and Guadalupe Zurita are additionally charged with obstruction of the FDA and that carries a maximum 20-year prison sentence if they are convicted.

Baldemar Zurita is slated for arraignment at 3 p.m. today. Future court dates for the other three defendants have not been scheduled, prosecutors said.