The News Room [News Release]
Sheriff Contact: John Roach: 313-224-0615
Release Date: Monday, November 22, 2004
Sheriff & Commission
Chair donate 10,000 servings of confiscated baby formula --- Enfamil & Similac seized in fraud bust will feed kids
of poor & abused women
While most people this week are focused having plenty of turkey
and cranberry sauce this Thanksgiving, a lot of needy mothers in
Metro Detroit have a much more simple desire: to make sure their
babies are fed. Help is on the way for many of them, thanks to
a donation of nearly 500 canisters of brand name baby formula made
by two top Wayne County officials.
Wayne County Sheriff Warren Evans and Jewel Ware, Chairwoman of
the Wayne County Commission, today helped deliver crates of the
baby food to the following agencies:
- Friends of Detroit & Tri-County food pantry
- Interim House,
a battered women’s shelter in the city
of Detroit
- Helping Unite Women & Children, a non-profit
agency that provides support services to women seeking to regain
custody of their children after state intervention.
The formula – enough to make 10,000 individual 8 oz. servings – was
seized a year ago by Sheriff’s Deputies as part of a retail
fraud operation being run out of a southwest Detroit food market.
The bust was the result of an investigation conducted by a retail
fraud task force that also included the prosecutor’s office
and investigators from Target and Home Depot.
Unable to verify the original owners of this specific stolen material,
the Sheriff’s Office recently assumed ownership. Rather than
dispose of perfectly good baby formula, Evans wanted get it into
the hands of needy mothers in Wayne County. So he contacted Ware,
whose district covers the area of Detroit generally inside Grand
Boulevard and includes several assistance agencies.
“This was a crime that has a happy ending,” Evans
said. “Those who broke the law have been prosecuted, and
at the other end, some mother’s who need it most can rest
assured they will have quality food for their babies this Holiday
season.”
Unloading several crates of Enfamil and Similac formula from a
sheriff’s office van, Evans and Ware were able to meet some
of the women who will benefit from the donation.
“These are women who are struggling to make ends meet, in
some cases because they are fleeing an abusive husband or boyfriend,” said
Ware, who district includes several relief agencies. “They
need our collective support and I’m just glad we are able
to help them in a way that has an immediate impact.”
About the Seizure
Sheriff’s deputies seized the formula in October 2003 from
a market on Oakwood in southwest Detroit after an investigation
revealed that several individuals, mostly drug addicts, had been
stealing the formula and selling it to the market for $2 per can.
Each can, which makes about 20 individual servings, retails for
about $15. The market would then sell the product at its sticker
price, making as much as a 700 percent profit.
Undercover sheriff’s deputies, using a confidential informant,
sold quantities of baby formula to the storeowner for $2 per can.
After the successful sale deputies executed a search warrant on
the establishment, where they found large quantities of the baby
food. Only that which the owner said he had not obtained illegally,
was confiscated. The owner, who was not prosecuted in the case,
never challenged the seizure.
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