Amos Miller is an Amish dairy and meat producer in Lancaster County, Pa. He’s been hassled by the state in past, and on Thursday state food authorities “illegally” raided his quiet farm and took away 37 boxes filled with his products. Amos reportedly hadn’t filed the proper signed documents in abeyance to the state health and safety regulators.
Amos Miller offers his organically grown and chemical-free cheeses, meats, raw milk, and eggs through a private club. His products are not sold in stores. His private club is thriving, thanks in part to the cheerleading of his attorney Robert Barnes who often urges people to sign up to Amos’s club to get clean, organic, and fresh products.
Miller has been on the state regulators’ radar for the past few years. Seven years ago, a smattering of his products had been cited for contamination. Miller’s supporters say this is a steady pressure campaign by state and federal regulators to put him out of business.
The Acting Director of the Pennsylvania Bureau of Food Safety swore out an affidavit which was used to get a search warrant. Barnes says that “the state unlawfully obtained a search warrant, based on materially false statements in an affidavit.” He said the acting director has a “known grievance against independent farmers like Amos, and, after the raid and finding no evidence of wrongdoing, then illegally ordered detained every item of food in one of Amos Miller’s coolers, including buffalo meat not even subject to federal regulation.”
Barnes said that the state “without notice, raided Amos’ farm, and detained everything Amos had in the farm’s freezer. They did so in a lawless manner, without appropriate authority, in violation of their own rules and regulations, despite never objecting to the prior resolutions reached with the federal government, and despite a complete failure by the state to even reach out to Amos’ known counsel.”
Barnes said the raiders broke the law because they ignored “the state’s own rules require advance notice, reasonable time frames for inspections, and a showing of credentials, none of which occurred here.” Indeed, he says taking Miller’s products was “patently illegal under Pennsylvania law.”
The Lancaster Patriot local newspaper says the affidavit was done at the behest of “the [acting director] NY state Department of Health [which…] confirmed positive case of a foodborne pathogen (STEC – Shiga toxin producing E. Coli) in an underage individual.”
The affidavit claims that Miller has not completed the application process through the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture for “registration, licensing, or permitting under the pertinent Retail Food Facility Safety Act, Food Safety Act, or Milk Sanitation Laws.”
Read more at: pjmedia.com