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Mar 4, 2008 5:51 pm US/Pacific
House Plans To Subpoena SoCal Slaughterhouse Owner
LOS ANGELES (AP) ―
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Undercover video shows a sick cow being jabbed with forklift blades at the Hallmark Meat Packing Co. in Chino, Calif.
The Humane Society/CBS
Members of a U.S. House oversight committee plan to order the owner of the Southern California slaughterhouse involved in last month's massive beef recall to testify on Capitol Hill.
Rep. John Dingell said Monday that members of the Committee on Energy and Commerce's Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations were to meet Wednesday to vote for a subpoena of Hallmark/Westland Meat Co. owner Steve Mendell.
Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, said Mendell will be required to testify on March 12. Mendell was a no-show at a meeting of the subcommittee last week.
Mendell did not immediately return a call for comment.
Federal officials recalled 143 million pounds of beef last month after the Humane Society of the United States released undercover video that showed workers at the Chino slaughterhouse shoving sick and crippled cows with forklifts and stunning them with electric prods to get them to stand.
A separate House committee heard testimony Tuesday from U.S. Department of Agriculture and public school officials relating to the recalled beef, which primarily went to the National School Lunch Program.
Kate Houston, deputy undersecretary for food nutrition and consumer services at USDA, told members of the House Education and Labor Committee that her agency was still tracing about 6 ½ million pounds of the recalled meat.
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