*WARNING: This article contains images of a pig's brain.
The director of a Nottinghamshire supermarket which sold pig's brains has been banned from selling fresh food. Council environmental health officers found fridges running too warm and numerous items for sale that were beyond their use-by date when they inspected Zosia Market in Bridge Street, Mansfield.
At Mansfield Magistrates' Court on Thursday 15, December, Karolina Wegiera, aged 24, of Mansfield, was banned from selling fresh food after admitting five charges under food hygiene regulations in connection with her business. Mansfield District Council prosecuted the supermarket store owner after environmental health officers found 83 items of foodstuff with expired or no use-by dates during routine food hygiene inspection in September 2021.
When visiting again in March this year, inspectors found refrigerators containing foods which, according to food hygiene regulations, should have been stored below 8°C. One fridge was found to be displaying a temperature of 18.6°C and the temperature of a cheese product within the refrigerator was found to be 19.6°C.
Read more: Nottinghamshire dealer used women's homes to peddle drugs and store weapons
The council also said a pig's brain from Poland was seized in the shop. t is not permitted to sell pig's brains for human consumption in the UK for health risk reasons.
The council's investigation found there were inadequate procedures in place to ensure food safety at the premises and, during an interview under caution with Karolina Wegiera in April 2022, she made admissions and provided no credible defence to the alleged offences put to her, the magistrates were told. In mitigation, the court heard the business venture had been a disaster and had cost Wegiera £60,000 over the past 18 months since opening and that she intended to shut the shop in the new year because it was not profitable.
The court fined her £80 for each offence and ordered her to pay a victim surcharge of £34 and costs of £566. Speaking after the case, Councillor Marion Bradshaw, Portfolio Holder for Safer Communities, Housing and Wellbeing, said: "We hope this case sends a strong message out to all food outlets in our district.
"Food hygiene rules are there for our safety and it is important that every shop and food retailer abides by them rigorously. This retailer now has a criminal record and all the implications of that as well as being severely curtailed in what types of foods she is able to sell in the future.
"We also hope it sends out a clear warning to retailers about maintaining safe fridge temperatures. It may seem tempting to turn down the dial a few notches to save energy costs in the current economic challenges, but as this case shows, it could be a false economy."
READ NEXT:
Released cop killer David Parfitt threatened to 'hunt' down officer and 'make him pay'
- Face of arsonist who set ex-girlfriend's family home on fire
- Men filmed 'fishing penny wishes' out of Victoria Centre fountain
- Children were trafficked to flood streets with heroin and crack cocaine
- Tattoo artist pulled drag artist's wig in Nottingham city centre bar
