Local News in Brief : Jail for Cheese Worker
A worker in an illegal cheese factory has been sentenced to 45 days in jail on a misdemeanor conviction of possessing misbranded cheese. Nasser Saif Alam, 24, of Bell was sentenced by Municipal Court Commissioner Julian Cathey after entering a plea of no contest.
He was the seventh and last person to be sentenced for crimes arising from operation of the clandestine factory in a garage and outbuildings in a South-Central Los Angeles neighborhood.
Alam had been free on $10,000 bail since his arrest last July. Authorities said he was driving a van loaded with queso fresco cheese and a sour cream-style milk product called crema from the unsanitary factory when he was arrested.
Deputy City Atty. Ruth Kwan, who prosecuted the case, said authorities found the potentially fatal Listeria monocytogenes bacteria on a tool in the van.
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