K A S H R U T . C O M_©

October 13,2018 from WGNTV:

"Three farmers who pleaded guilty Friday in a large-scale organic grain fraud scheme were lured into participation by a Missouri businessman who was its mastermind, a defense lawyer said."
"The farmers “convinced themselves to look the other way” while Randy Constant marketed the non-organic corn and soybeans they grew in Overton, Nebraska, as certified organic, attorney Clarence Mock said. They received significantly higher prices for their grain than they would have on the open market, and improperly rationalized their involvement because they weren’t personally making misrepresentations to customers, he said."
"The case is getting attention in the fast-growing organic agriculture industry, which usually handles violations of federal standards through regulatory action instead of criminal prosecution."
"The three admitted that they knew the grain being marketed as organic was mostly non-organic because it came from non-certified fields or from certified fields where they applied pesticides and nitrogen in violation of USDA standards."