Page 93 - Fall2013

RAW MILK UPDATES
by Pete Kennedy, Esq.

WISCONSIN – VERNON HERSHBERGER
Loganville dairy farmer Vernon Hershberger was sentenced to $1,000 in fines and $513 in court costs for his conviction
on violating a hold order the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) officials
had placed on food in his on-farm store during a June 2010 raid. A member of Hershberger’s buyers club wrote a
check at the sentencing hearing to cover the fine (see Wise Traditions Summer 2013 issue for background). Hershberger
had been acquitted on the other three charges against him which were (1) operating a farm store without a retail food
establishment permit, (2) operating a dairy farm without a milk producer license, and (3) operating a dairy plant facility
without a license.
Judge Guy Reynolds sentenced Hershberger on June 13 at the Sauk County courthouse; in sentencing the farmer, the
judge rejected a motion filed by the Wisconsin Department of Justice (DOJ) to have Hershberger jailed for violating a
January 2012 release order prohibiting him from distributing food to members of his private buyers club. Hershberger
had stated to a reporter that he had never stopped supplying the buyers club members with food.

Judge Reynolds could have sentenced Hershberger to as much as a $10,000 fine and a year in jail for the hold order
conviction but the acquittals on the licensing charges and letters from Hershberger’s supporters convinced the judge to
issue a light sentence. What was unusual about the letters of support was that three of them were from members of the
jury that convicted the farmer on the hold order violation.

The judge said it was the first time in all his years on the bench that jurors who had convicted a defendant had asked
for leniency on the defendant’s sentencing. The jury could only consider whether there was a hold order and whether
Hershberger violated the hold order—facts the farmer admitted to during his testimony. Judge Reynolds had made a
pre-trial ruling prohibiting evidence from being introduced on the validity of the hold order, a ruling which effectively
prevented the jurors from acquitting the farmer on the hold order charge.
One juror, Michelle Boltrass-Hopp, wrote in her letter to the judge, “I believe that our three not guilty verdicts support
the fact that the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection should never have issued a
holding order to Mr. Hershberger.” The jury foreman in the case, Paul Freitag, was quoted as saying that the jury “didn’t
have the truth” and that “if we could have ruled on whether that was a legitimate hold order, we probably would have
found him innocent.”

Hershberger has appealed the conviction on the hold order to the Wisconsin 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. It could be
a year or more before the appellate court issues a decision.

MINNESOTA – ALVIN SCHLANGEN
On August 15, Freeport farmer Alvin Schlangen was convicted by a Stearns County jury on five counts for violations of
the Minnesota food and dairy code. The five charges against him were (1) operating without a food handlers permit, (2)
distributing misbranded food, (3) not storing eggs at the correct temperature, (4) selling custom processed meat, and (5)
violating an embargo order (i.e., removing food that had been taped by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture dur-
ing a 2010 raid on Schlangen’s farm). After the jury announced its verdict, Judge Vicky Landwehn sentenced Schlangen
only on the food handlers permit charge and gave him a $1,000 fine (with $700 suspended), a suspended 90-day jail
term, and one year’s probation.

Last September, Schlangen had been acquitted in Hennepin County for three violations of the state food and dairy code,
with two of the charges being the same as the ones he faced in Stearns County (i.e., not having a food handlers permit
and distributing misbranded food).

Schlangen is a volunteer manager for the Freedom Food Coop (FFC) delivering raw milk and other nutrient-dense foods
to members of the private food buyers club. Unlike the Hennepin County case, the Stearns County trial concerned
events before Schlangen started FFC. The Stearns County verdict did nothing to contradict the Hennepin County jury’s
finding that the farmer’s deliveries to the FFC buyers club members did not violate the law.

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