Lawsuit Accuses Rite Aid of Selling Expired Merchandise

A group of California prosecutors sued Rite Aid Corp. on Tuesday, charging that the drugstore chain sold condoms, contraceptives and baby formula long past their expiration dates, even after the chain had been warned to correct the problem.

Prompted by a consumer’s complaint in January, investigators found more than 200 outdated products in about 50 of the chain’s 660 stores in California. Some of the condoms were four years past their expiration date, Merced County Dist. Atty. Gordon Spencer said.

He was joined by prosecutors from Alameda and Santa Barbara counties and the city of San Diego in a consumer protection lawsuit that asks a judge to order Rite Aid to make restitution to victims and to pay civil penalties that could run to $2,500 for each expired item sold.

The plaintiffs said expired merchandise, including spermicides, condoms and infant formula, continued to appear on Rite Aid store shelves in California despite written assurances from company officials that expired products were no longer being sold.

At a news conference in Oakland to announce the suit, the prosecutors displayed a 12-pack of Ramses Extra Spermicidal condoms that they said was purchased at a Rite Aid store last month despite a “sell-by” date of March 1995.

Prosecutors had no reports of infants falling ill from outdated products, but they cautioned that formulas lose their nutritional value over time, and that condoms and spermicides lose their effectiveness.

Rite Aid officials said they were surprised by the suit, adding that the Camp Hill, Pa.-based chain had worked to address the problem of out-of-date products since it first came to light in February.

“We have over the past few months repeatedly re-educated our managers regarding our policies on out-of-date merchandise,” Rite Aid spokeswoman Karen Rugen said.