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California cheesemaker linked to deadly listeria outbreak ordered to shut down
A California cheese and dairy company has been ordered to cease production in the wake of a years-long listeria outbreak that killed two people and sickened dozens more, the U.S. Department of Justice announced on Wednesday.
Rizo-López Foods and its owners have discontinued all operations related to the preparing and processing of food, according to an injunction approved on Tuesday by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District.
Evidence that surfaced earlier in the year linked products made by Modesto-based Rizo-López to the outbreak first detected more than a decade ago, in June of 2014, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At least 26 people in 11 states were stricken in the outbreak, with 23 hospitalized as a result, including two fatalities, said the agency.
One person died in California in 2017, and another fatality occurred in Texas in 2020, the agency stated. The CDC investigated the outbreak in 2017 and 2021, but did not have enough information to identify a specific brand.
The CDC and Food and Drug Administration reopened an investigation in January after Hawaii officials detected listeria in a sample of Rizo Brothers Aged Cotija. That prompted a limited recall, which in February was expanded to include more than 60 products sold nationwide.
“The Justice Department and FDA will continue to work closely on enforcement actions against food manufacturers who fail to meet their obligations and put the health of their customers at risk,” Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, stated in a news release.
Listeria is most likely to affect pregnant people and newborns, people 65 and older, and those with weakened immune systems, according to the CDC. Infection symptoms typically start within two weeks of eating contaminated food and can include fever, muscle aches, nausea, tiredness, vomiting and diarrhea. More serious cases may also include headache, stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance and convulsions.
Social media star Jake Paul defeated boxing legend Mike Tyson in a highly anticipated fight with an age difference of over three decades between the two contenders. The Friday night win for the YouTuber-turned-pro-boxer was streamed on Netflix from the home of the Dallas Cowboys in Texas.
Paul defeated Tyson by an unanimous decision after the two fighters went eight full rounds.
Fight night for the 58-year-old Tyson and 27-year-old Paul came following doubts over whether it would happen at all. The fight was originally scheduled for July, but was postponed after the former heavyweight champion experienced an ulcer flare-up on a plane in May.
A different kind of flare-up happened during the official weigh-in Thursday with Tyson slapping Paul in the face. Tyson later told the New York Post that Paul had stepped on his toe when the two were toe to toe onstage.
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What is Jake Paul’s fight record?
With the win, Paul’s record improved to 11-1.
Was Jake Paul predicted to win?
Oddsmakers had Paul as the slight favorite to win. Former heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua also went with Paul.
How much prize money does Jake Paul win?
Paul was expected to earn about $40 million from the fight, according to DraftKings Network and other online sources.
Promoters didn’t reveal the payouts ahead of the bout. Paul is a co-founder of Most Valuable Promotions, which produced the fight.
Does Mike Tyson still get paid?
Tyson was expected to take home around $20 million for the fight, according to DraftKings and other online reports.
Tyson entered professional boxing in 1985 and became the youngest heavyweight champion in history a year later. After serving time for a rape conviction in the 1990s, Tyson won the World Boxing Council and World Boxing Association titles.
He retired from boxing in 2005 and was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2011. He last fought in a 2020 exhibition match against former four-division world champ Roy Jones Jr.
“He like put on another 20 pounds from when I fought him, so he’s more bigger and he’s more dangerous because more size, more power, so it’s going to be a tough one for Jake to climb,” Jones told CBS News ahead of the fight.
Anne Marie Lee and
contributed to this report.
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The U.S. received written assurance from Iran before the presidential election that its leadership was not actively trying to assassinate President-elect Donald Trump, CBS News confirmed, according to a source with direct knowledge of the correspondence. The message arrived after the White House in September affirmed that killing a former U.S. president or former U.S. official would be seen by the Biden administration as an act of war.
“We consider this a national and homeland security matter of the highest priority, and we strongly condemn Iran for these brazen threats,” National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said in a statement in September.
Iran said in its message, which was conveyed by a third party, that it understood this premise. The Wall Street Journal first reported Iran’s message to the U.S.
The Justice Department is currently prosecuting at least two individuals alleged to have been part of murder-for-hire plots to kill Trump while he was still a candidate. One operative working for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps told federal investigators that he was tasked in September with “surveilling, and, ultimately, assassinating” Trump, according to court records unsealed last week.
Prosecutors said Farhad Shakeri, who is believed to be residing in Iran, told investigators in a phone interview that unnamed IRGC officials pushed him to plan an attack against Trump to take place in October. If the plan could not come together in time, the Iranian officials directed Shakeri to delay the plot until after the election because the official “assessed that [Trump] would lose the election,” the charging documents said.
In early August, a Pakistani national with alleged ties to Iran was arrested and charged with plotting a murder-for-hire scheme targeting U.S. government officials and politicians, according to charging documents unsealed Tuesday.
A U.S. official pointed out that Iran did not task its most effective proxy force, Hezbollah, with carrying out these plots. This official described Iran’s approach to date as “nice if it works. If it doesn’t, then it’s not a problem.”
In response to inquiries suggesting that “Iran told U.S. it wouldn’t try to kill Trump”, the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran said it would not comment on official messages between two countries.
The mission said in a statement, “The Islamic Republic of Iran has long declared its commitment to pursuing Martyr Soleimani’s assassination through legal and judicial avenues, while adhering fully to the recognized principles of international law.”
Trump has raised the ire of Iranians for a few reasons. He exited the international Iran nuclear agreement, which had lifted some sanctions in exchange for restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. He also directed the 2020 airstrike that killed top Iranian commander Gen. Qasem Soleimani. Since then, some Trump administration officials and military officials received threats from the regime, among them, Robert O’Brien, who was national security adviser during the strike. His predecessor in the job, John Bolton, who was part of the maximum pressure campaign that exerted sanctions pressure on Tehran, has also received threats.
In 2022, the U.S. intelligence community assessed that Iran would threaten Americans — both directly and via proxy attacks — and was committed to developing networks inside the U.S. Two persistent threat assessments submitted to Congress by the State Department in January 2022 cited a “serious and credible threat” to the lives of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former Trump administration Iran envoy Brian Hook. The non-public assessments showed that throughout 2021 and again in 2022, the State Department determined that round-the-clock, U.S.-taxpayer-funded diplomatic security details were needed to protect both men. That continues today.
Multiple former officials have spoken to CBS about duty-to-warn notices that they have recently received from the FBI and other agencies regarding the ongoing threat from Iran and Iranian-hired actors, implying the U.S. is taking the threat seriously and not taking the Iranian regime’s assurances at face value.
contributed to this report.
