Major food producers blackmailed with poison

A number of Belgian (IJsboerke, Jules Destrooper) and foreign (Lavazza en Ferrero) food producers have been blackmailed with letters sent from Belgium, demanding 300,000 euros to keep their products from being poisoned.

“Just continue enjoying our products”

A letter with a white powder has been found at ice cream producer IJsboerke on 3 April, and another one earlier this week at cookie producer Jules Destrooper. Apparently, food producers abroad received the same threats. Lavazza and Ferrero are said to also have received threatening letters posted in Belgium, where the judiciary speaks of “companies in the whole of Western Europe”. If the blackmailers do not receive 300,000 euros in bitcoins by 20 May, they threaten to contaminate the companies’ production lines with the poisonous oleandrin, a substance that can cause cardiac arrests.

The Belgian police and judiciary have opened an investigation into the blackmailers, pointing out that the fact that the letters were posted in Belgium does not necessarily mean that the blackmailers themselves live in Belgium. Meanwhile, the food producers say they are not worried: a Jules Destrooper spokesperson told news agency Belga that their products are completely safe: “We just continue to enjoy our products”, they say without a shadow of a doubt.