46 punished for selling meat from sick pigs

A court in East China has jailed 46 people for selling meat from sick pigs.

Punishments ranged from six-and-a-half years in jail to an 800,000 yuan ($128,729) fine.

The case was heard in Wenling, a city in Zhejiang province.

Last year police arrested 65 people accused of selling meat from sick pigs and confiscated more than 10 metric tons of product.

Forty-eight people were handed over to prosecutors accused of producing or selling foods that failed safety standards, police said.

Excessive amounts of bacteria were detected in the pork products, which can pose serious health risks, the court said.

Zhang Xingbing, one of the defendants, was convicted of buying more than 1,000 pigs that died from disease and selling the meat after slaughtering them between 2010 and April 2012.

Chen Guanghua, who worked at a meat factory in Wenling, was found guilty of introducing pig farmers to Zhang.

The defendants also included farmers who knowingly sold pigs killed by illness, the court said.