A federal district court judge has ruled in the Daniel Allgyer matter, holding that Allgyer cannot sell anymore raw milk to a buying club located across state lines (Allgyer’s dairy is in Pennsylvania).  Jon Rutter profiled the judge’s opinion at Lancaster online:

In his opinion, Stengel discounted an arrangement by which a private group, Right to Choose Healthy Food’s Rawesome Club, was leasing Allgyer’s cows and distributing milk to Grassfed on The Hill members.

Buyers each paid a $25 fee to join the Rawesome Club, according to court papers.

But, Stengel wrote, such “cow sharing” transactions amounted to a “subterfuge” in which raw milk was taken out of state and left at a “drop point.”

This issue, and this case specifically, has been percolating for some time, and it is good to see a judge put pen to paper on the issue of whether cow-shares are a valid legal arrangement for selling raw milk in states that don’t allow it, or across state lines.  His reasoning sounds familiar–i.e. that the FDA does have the power to regulate the interstate distribution of raw milk under the commerce clause, and that so-called cow-shares are a sham.  It validates my opinion a couple of years ago in an article on Food Safety News titled “Cow Share Agreements: Fooling Nobody,” followed by “Raw Milk, An Issue of Safety or Freedom?”

Seems like there is a bit of a disconnect between raw milk proponents and valid legal analysis.  Honestly, their case is more effectively fought in the halls of state legislatures and city halls nationally, not in courthouses. 

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Photo of Drew Falkenstein Drew Falkenstein

Drew Falkenstein joined Marler Clark in January, 2004 and has concentrated his practice in representing victims of foodborne illness. He has litigated nationwide against some of the biggest food corporations in the world, including Dole, Kellogg’s, and McDonald’s.  He has worked on landmark…

Drew Falkenstein joined Marler Clark in January, 2004 and has concentrated his practice in representing victims of foodborne illness. He has litigated nationwide against some of the biggest food corporations in the world, including Dole, Kellogg’s, and McDonald’s.  He has worked on landmark cases that have helped shape food safety policy, HACCP protocol, and consumer rights, such as the E. coli outbreak in fresh spinach in 2006 and the 2008 Peanut Corporation of America outbreak of Salmonella. A frequent speaker for the not-for-profit organization Outbreak, Inc, Mr. Falkenstein travels the country to address public and environmental health organizations as well as food safety meetings and annual educational conferences.  He speaks on the intersection of law and public health, and addresses companies on how to prevent food borne illness outbreaks.