Brooklyn Inmates Ate Carrot Cake Laced With Rat Poison: Report

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN – A poisoned Thanksgiving meal that made Brooklyn House of Detention inmates severely ill will cost the city $232,000, the Daily News reports. A group of 16 inmates were given up to $26,000 each after carrot cake and sweet potatoes filled with rat poison was eaten by them inside the corrections facility in 2015.

The food, later confirmed to have high levels of the lethal poison, caused at least three of the inmates to pass out and forced others to undergo CT scans and have their stomachs pumped, the federal lawsuit claimed. Some were even denied medical treatment and forced to suffer inside the locked-down facility, their attorney Greg Zenon told the Daily News.

Inmates first noticed something was wrong when a prisoner who worked in pest control noticed green pellets he recognized as rat poison were in the carrot cake.

But a jail officer in charge of the kitchen said the pellets were clusters of nuts and fruits, though she refused to sample the food herself, the lawsuit alleged.

Jail officers soon put the Atlantic Avenue facility on lockdown when they noticed some inmates trying to call 311 and 911. Some inmates were met with laughter when they begged the officers for medical help, the lawsuit claimed.

Officers threw the remaining tainted food away, forcing investigators to take samples from the garbage, the suit alleged.

Those samples had high levels of Brodifacoum, a highly lethal rat poison. It remains unclear who put the poison in the food, according to the Daily News.

The lawsuit sought $1 million for each inmate, but most were given less than $20,000.

Three inmates who went into convulsions and lost consciousness received $26,000, seven more were given $16,000 and three others $10,000. The remaining were awarded $1,500, $750 and $500.

No officers appear to have been disciplined for failing to follow a requirement to report food poisoning cases within an hour, Zenon said. The city did not admit any guilt in the settlement.

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