Restaurant Closed And Health Permit Pulled After Employees Caught Putting Laxative on Pizza

Stock image of a pizza. (Skeeze/Pixabay)

A restaurant in North Texas was forced to close temporarily and its health permit was pulled after police found that employees put laxatives on a pizza served to another employee.

The incident happened on the night of April 19 at at the pizza place at 417 East State Highway 199, reported the CBS local.

A resident informed the Springtown Police that an employee at Mr. Jim’s Pizza bragged on social media about secretly adding Miralax on another employee’s pizza.

Miralax is an over-the-counter remedy that is used to treat occasional constipation.

During an inspection of Mr. Jim’s Pizza in Springtown, police discovered that the pizza the three employees tainted was unknowingly eaten by another employee, who is now sick.

The three employees told police that they didn’t put any laxative on the pizzas sold to customers.

Police called the city’s health inspector to Mr. Jim’s and upon investigation, the pizzeria’s health permit was pulled and it was temporarily closed.

The incident is under investigation and the police told CBS Local that the three employees will face charges. The restaurant will be inspected again on Monday.

In another health incident related to pizzas, a pizzeria in Indiana was closed down February last year after mouse droppings were discovered baked into the pizza.

The Indianapolis Star reported that the shop was closed before it was reopened a few days later. The Marion County Public Health Department shut down the establishment as a customer found “numerous mouse droppings” inside the crust.

The customer picked up a pepperoni Hot-N-Ready pizza on Tuesday at 2181 N. Meridian St. in northern Indianapolis. Health department supervisor Derek Trackwell said the customer found the mouse droppings after leaving the restaurant.

“Fortunately, they did not consume any of it,” Trackwell said.

They took the pizza back and called local officials. Police then contacted health department officials, who asked the customer if he consumed any of the pizza, according to the Star.

“There was a good amount. It was very obvious that there were numerous mouse droppings in the pizza,” Trackwell said of the testing. “It’s not very often that we run into that amount of evidence of mouse droppings in a food product.”

Johnathan McNeil was identified as the customer who bought the tainted pizza, Fox5 reported, but it was his girlfriend that picked it up.

“She looked at the pizza and realized there was like doo-doo looking stuff on the pizza,” McNeil said.

When he went back, employees didn’t understand what he was talking about.

“All of them were looking at my pizza dumbfounded as if they didn’t know what’s going on,” said McNeil, “I said ‘That’s mouse doo-doo on the bottom of my pizza.’”

When the health department investigated, they found mouse droppings in the store and “along the walls throughout the facility,” the Star reported, but nothing in the dough or any other food in, or on cabinets.

“You’d think we’d find droppings in the actual product, but none were found,” he said. “That’s been a question that all of us had, to be honest with you. That’s probably the biggest mystery.”

The chain was inspected and reopened Wednesday.

“They don’t want to have to be in the media for the wrong reasons, so they want to get in and take care of things as swift as possible,” he said.

Epoch Newsroom contributed to this report.