A Kentucky man who was working for Dart Container has been accused of putting shards of glass into multiple sleeves of foam cups. Dart is calling the incident a “deliberate attack on our company.”
According to the County Sheriff’s arrest warrant, the suspect “intentionally placed approximately 139 shards of glass in multiple sleeves of styrofoam cups that were to be distributed to franchises in multiple states,” reports the Bowling Green Daily News.
It seems that one of Dart’s customers received some of the cups in question, as Dart Container President Jim Lammers said in a statement to the newspaper that “upon receiving notification from the customer, Dart took immediate action to determine the source of the contamination.”
That’s when the company took a look at surveillance footage, and said “it became clear that a single employee working in one building targeted Dart by intentionally contaminating some cups with glass.”
The county sheriff’s office opened an investigation into the worker after the company contacted it regarding a possible product tampering that involved the man when he was an employee of the company.
“Upon investigation and review of video [the suspect] was identified and shards of glass were retrieved from two sleeves of styrofoam cups,” according to an affidavit for a search warrant. “Additional shards were located in an area that [the suspect] was operating.”
The sheriff also found glass particles in a building on the suspect’s property, court records show.
Lammers called the incident a “deliberate attack” on Dart, without identifying which customer received the shipment of cups with shards in it.
“Dart Container Corporation recently learned that several foam cups shipped to a U.S. customer were contaminated with glass,” Lammers said in a statement “The contamination was a deliberate attack on our company, not the result of a failure in Dart’s safety or quality control protocols.”
The suspect was arrested last week on 139 counts each of first-degree wanton endangerment and possession of a destructive device or booby trap. His bond is currently set at $1,390,000.
Hart County man accused of putting glass in drinking cup sleeves [Bowling Green Daily News]
by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist