FDA Bars Seafood Dealer from Importing Food for 20 Years
According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a food importer from Virginia, who was sentenced to five years in prison for conspiring to import falsely labeled catfish from Vietnam to avoid paying import tariffs, has been barred from importing food into
the United States for the next 20 years. This action apparently marks the first time the agency used its debarment authority under a law allowing the FDA to “debar a person from importing an article of food or offering such an article for import into the United States if that person has been convicted of a felony for conduct relating to the importation into the United States of any food.” The law also allows debarment in instances of the importation of adulterated food posing “a threat of serious adverse health consequences or death to humans or animals.”
FDA reported that Peter Xuong Lam, president of Virginia Star Seafood Corp., was found guilty before a federal court in California on four felony counts relating to a conspiracy to sell frozen catfish fillets falsely labeled as sole, grouper, flounder, snakehead, channa, and other fish species to avoid paying federal import tariffs. While catfish is subject to the tariffs, the other fish are not. The alleged conspiracy reportedly involved more than 10 million pounds of frozen catfish fillets. Twelve other individuals and companies have been convicted of charges arising from the conspiracy, although the organizer remains a fugitive, possibly living in Vietnam. In addition to a prison sentence, the court apparently ordered Lam to forfeit more than $12 million to reimburse the government for antidumping duties. See FDA Press Release, December 11. 2009.
