Texas man gets 30 days, $2,500 fine for licking Blue Bell ice cream causing Walmart to throw away entire batch
A prankster has been sentenced to 30 days in prison after he was filmed licking a tub of ice cream in Walmart before placing it back on the shelf.
In addition, D'Adrien Anderson was also given 180 days probation over two years, ordered to pay a $1,000 fine, as well as a $1,565 penalty to Blue Bell Creameries, the ice cream manufacturer, ABC 13 reports.
Anderson, who posted a 20-second clip of the incident on social media back in August 2019, admitted to the crime of public mischief in January.
CCTV footage showed that Anderson later bought the tub of ice cream. However, the Walmart outlet in Port Arthur, Texas, had no choice but to throw out all of its Blue Bell ice cream as a safety precaution.
Anderson captioned the video, "Happy national soft ice cream day lmao," before it garnered over 160,000 views, 2,000 comments and 2,200 shares in total.
The prankster was participating in a disturbing viral trend last year which saw people licking Blue Bell ice cream and placing the containers back on supermarket freezers.
The trend was initiated by a video that emerged early last year showing a woman opening a tub of ice cream, licking it, and placing it back on the store shelf. The footage went viral and was viewed more than eight million times on Twitter, sparking a major backlash online.
"We want to thank our consumers for alerting us to the recent food tampering incident," Blue Bell Creameries said in a statement. "We take this issue very seriously and are currently working with law enforcement, retail partners and social media platforms. This type of incident will not be tolerated."
"Food safety is a top priority, and we work hard to provide a safe product and maintain the highest level of confidence from our consumers. During production, our half gallons are flipped upside down and sent to a hardening room where the ice cream freezes to the lid creating a natural seal," they explained.
"The lids are frozen tightly to the carton. Any attempt at opening the product should be noticeable. We will continue to monitor this situation," the ice cream manufacturer added.