Raw Foods Attacked By The Government. What's Next?

[RawZi]

Friday, July 2, 2010 at 11:03AM

From the Aajonus Vonderplanitz raw milk web site, www.rawmilk.org.
The question I keep asking myself about the raid Wednesday on Rawsome Foods is this: why is the government confronting Aajonus Vonderplanitz?

Certainly officials had to know going into his private food outlet in Venice, CA, that they were taking on someone who is both extremely knowledgeable about the laws and also more than willing to challenge the authorities.

Quite simply, Vonderplanitz won't take grief from anyone, least of all public health regulators. He's already made that clear. Yesterday, his lawyer walked out of a hearing scheduled by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. "That hearing was to occur less than 24 hours after the raid; impossible, no sane court would support such brief notice," he says.
 
Moreover, according to Vonderplanitz, the search warrant used in the Wednesday raid claims the buying club was "used as the means of committing a felony." Serious allegation.

In an email to members explaining the events of the last couple days, Vonderplanitz says he previously confronted the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health in 2005, when it tried to shutter Rawsome, quoting from a letter he sent then:

"Without intending to be antagonistic, we must face the legal implications regarding your trespassing onto that property clearly posted as no trespassing. Seven of the members testified that you enter the posted NO-Trespassing premises without permission or warrant. Four of them testified that they told you to leave the property immediately but you refused and did not leave for about 30 minutes. That was antagonism and harassment against us. We are willing to forgive your trespass unless you and the county continue to harass us. Resultantly, the Hearing Notice is without legal merit. This letter and supportive document have explained everything that you would have learned in a hearing and we choose not to attend."

In his email, Vonderplanitz asks, "Why, five years later, is the county attempting to close Rawsome?"

He offers some possible reasons, including his backing of raw dairy farmers who have been targeted by federal and state officials in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Illinois. Government officials "are upset," he states.

But beyond those immediate issues, wonders Vonderplanitz, "What is the larger picture/story here?" 
He offers his ideas: "We must consider that the government is aligned with Big Dairy and has clandestine representatives in government. They want to continue to monopolize dairy and regulate it to the point that small dairy farmers cannot survive with or without them. The proverbial thorn in their sides is the healthy raw dairy movement. It has also been suggested and argued by many people that there exists a ruling class that wants to dumb-down everybody so that they can be easily controlled. The greater civilization grows in numbers, the more they feel the need to control people. Lowering people's health results in a weak populations that is not going to have the health, energy and time to stop politicians from stealing tax dollars for banksters,"

He also argues that local government agencies are doing the work of the federal government because they are so dependent on government funds.

His conclusion: "Obviously to me, they have come to my backyard Los Angeles to cut off the legs of Right to Consume Healthy Foods/me. (RTCHF is his nonprofit organization that sponsors other private food organizations.) They want to win this here so they can establish precedents. We cannot allow that to happen. It will affect everyone in USA and Canada."

I wonder if there's another factor here that Vonderplanitz doesn't allude to directly. If you read through his buying club membership materials, he takes what many in public health would consider to be a radical view of food rights. The application says the member wants food that is not only free of chemicals and undue heating or cooling, but also "may contain microbes, including but not limited to salmonella, E.coli, campylobacter,listeria, gangrene and parasites..." In other words, don't try to give us protection we don't want.

This promises to be a protracted battle. Vonderplanitz invites those who want to support his legal efforts to contribute through his web site.

***

Shari Danielson, who runs a popular food web site, a couple weeks ago came up with this idea that food poisoning lawyer Bill Marler and I should engage in a debate about raw milk. So we went back and forth via email, and she just posted the entire exchange. Interesting debate, now that I look at it again...and we kept it civil.

 

Update on Saturday, July 3, 2010 at 08:26PM by  The Complete Patient
Word I have from an associate of Aajonus Vonderplanitz is that the Rawsome buying club in Venice, CA, was open and busy on Saturday, when it's normally scheduled to be open.

It's still a mystery as to why FBI agents might have been present. Maybe the local police and agents from the FDA (some of whom are armed) didn't think they could handle a bunch of foodies without backup. As to why the media haven't covered, keep in mind that the Los Angeles area much larger than Minneapolis, with a lot more "noise" competing for media attention. Besides, the established media more likely to react when  government officials announce actions, like they did in Minnesota, than with the Rawsome situation, where it was just ordinary people making announcements.

 The Complete Patient |  10 Comments |  Email Article |  Share Article
Authorities, Including FBI, Raid Aajonus Vonderplanitz' CA Buying Club and Raw Dairy Herdshare in New Buying Group Assault; He Orders Staff to Stay Open, Ignore Red Tag

 Thursday, July 1, 2010 at 03:03PM

Aajonus Vonderplanitz
The food police have increased the heat on private providers of nutrient-dense foods, raiding and shutting down Rawsome Foods, a Venice, CA, buying club run by raw-food advocate Aajonus Vonderplanitz.

In addition, the authorities have gone after a nearby goat dairy Vonderplanitz has a herdshare arrangement with--one they raided a year-and-a-half ago, run by Sharon Palmer.

Vonderplanitz is a celebrity of sorts in the emerging raw-food movement, which encourages consumption of not only raw dairy, but raw meat, fish, and vegetables as a means of ensuring good health and countering disease. He travels the world running workshops on the raw food diet, and is understood to have been out of the country yesterday when the raid was conducted by a collection of agents; he reported to several associates Friday afternoon that the raiding party included agents from the Los Angeles Police, city and county health departments, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Involvement of the FBI in a food buying club assault would be a first.

The raiding party confiscated dairy products and honey. By Friday afternoon, he had ordered his staff to open the buying club, and ignore the red tag placed on the property to signify its shutdown.

Most immediately, the legal reason behind the shutdown was the absence of a permit from the Los Angeles Department of Public Health to operate the buying club, according to the text of the shutdown order reproduced on a Yelp.com site.

It's difficult not to think that the raid on Vonderplanitz's buying club isn't an intensification of the pressure on private food groups nationally, including the case against Max Kane in Wisconsin, the four buying clubs in Massachusetts, and more recently the shutdown of the Traditional Foods Warehouse in Minneapolis.

Vonderplanitz is one of the earliest supporters of raw milk, having fought crackdowns in California during the 1980s in Los Angeles. He was an early investor in Organic Pastures Dairy Co., and has provided legal and research documents supporting raw milk to farmers fighting regulators in various parts of the country. He says he used a raw diet to help him recover from terminal cancer when he was in his 20s. Max Kane credits the Vonderplanitz diet with helping him recover from Crohn's disease.?

Update on Thursday, July 1, 2010 at 10:42PM by  The Complete Patient
I originally posted this Friday afternoon, and updated it Friday evening based on several additional reports.

 The Complete Patient |  13 Comments

[miles]

ah mah gad.

[kurite]

 

[RawZi]

    Exactly.

[King Salmon]

Yeah,there used to be a dairy company in California called "Stueve's"(not sure if they're still around).They used to sell raw butter,cheeses(cottage cheese was my favorite)and raw cream.These products were readily available on the store shelves.I can't remember about the milk though.But anyway,the guy at the health food store dairy department told me that they(Stueve's) used to get hassled all the time.

[PaleoPhil]

"The raiding party confiscated dairy products and honey."

"Honey intoxication is caused by the consumption of honey produced from the nectar of rhododendrons."
http://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodSafety/FoodborneIllness/FoodborneIllnessFoodbornePathogensNaturalToxins/BadBugBook/ucm071128.htm

If the Feds crack down on raw honey too, it could be their downfall, as they might piss off a wider base of raw dieters beyond the raw dairy eaters.

[PaleoPhil]

Michael Schmidt (raw milk activist) vows to carry on
http://3wheeledcheese.com/2012/02/15/michael-schmidt-raw-milk-activist-vows-to-carry-on/

“This entire case was not about the money,” he said. “It was a matter of principle.”

Schmidt was charged in 2006 following an undercover police operation and armed raid of his farm. In 1994, he was fined $3,500 on similar charges and placed on two years probation.

Earlier this month, the outspoken farmer ended a month-long hunger strike following an impromptu meeting with Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty.

Schmidt’s lawyer, Karen Selick, says she plans to appeal the sentence.

Canada is the only G8 country to ban the sale of raw milk.

Let's hope the tide reverses, rather than spreads. If we can't even put what we want to in our bellies, how long before they totally enslave us?  Vote your conscience, vote Ron Paul. Live in harmony with your principals, as best you can.