North Carolina company mislabeled meat as Atlantic blue crab

COLUMBIA, N.C. – A North Carolina seafood company has been charged with selling almost 200,000 pounds of foreign crab meat falsely labeled domestic Atlantic blue crab for $4 million.

Charges filed last month by the U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of North Carolina say Capt. Neill’s Seafood of Columbia repackaged and mislabeled crab from Asia and South America as a “Product of the USA.”

The charging documents accuse the company of selling the mislabeled crab meat from 2012 through 2015.

The Virginian-Pilot reports that a company statement acknowledged that a “small portion” of its crab meat didn’t have a sticker accurately listing its country of origin. But the company said the meat was still high quality and safe to eat, and it says they’ve only sold correctly labeled domestic crab since then.