21451. Action to enjoin and restrain interstate shipment of adulterated beer.
U. S. v. Rubsam & Horrmann Brewing Co.   Temporary injunction 
granted.   Action subsequently discontinued.   (In. No. 273.)
selling of beer and had -been and was, at the time of filing the complaint, 
causing the introduction and delivery for introduction into interstate com- 
merce of beer which was adulterated under Section 402 (a) (3) and (4), in 
that it consisted in whole or in part of filthy substances by reason of its 
contamination with insect filth in the course of manufacture so as to result 
in the incorporation of soluble portions of insect filth in the finished product, 
and in that the beer had been and was being prepared, packed, and held 
under insanitary conditions at the defendant's plant whereby it may have 
become contaminated with filth.
The insanitary conditions in the defendant's plant resulted from and con- 
sisted of the presence of live beetles, silverfish, ants, moths, flour beetles, saw- 
tooth grain beetles, lesser grain borer beetles, larvae, larval cast skins, pupae, 
cockroaches, insect fragments, clumps of insect excreta and frass, bird 
feathers, bird excreta, and rodent pellets in and around places in the plant 
where the raw materials used in the manufacture of the beer were received, 
conveyed, and stored; in and around equipment used for the conveyance and 
storage of raw materials; and in and around equipment used for manufactur- 
ing and preparing beer. The insanitary conditions resulted also from general 
carelessness on the part of the defendant and its employees whereby the 
beer prepared, packed, and held in the defendant's plant was subjected to 
contamination.
The complaint alleged further that the defendant had on hand at its plant 
approximately 1,016 barrels of adulterated beer which was to be bottled, 
canned, or placed in kegs and thereafter distributed, and that a substantial 
proportion, in the usual and ordinary course of business, would be shipped 
in interstate commerce, thereby constituting a menace to interstate commerce 
because of contamination with filth.
DISPOSITION: On December 9, 1953, an order was entered directing the de- 
fendant to show cause why a preliminary injunction should not issue. This 
order also enjoined the defendant from introducing or delivering for intro- 
duction into interstate commerce any of the stock of the 1,016 barrels of beer 
then held at the defendant's plant, until such time as a motion for a pre- 
liminary injunction had been heard.
Following correction of the objectionable conditions in the defendant's plant 
and destruction of the adulterated stock of beer, the court entered an order 
on March 17, 1954, dissolving the injunction of December 9, 1953, and order- 
ing that the action be discontinued.