APD: Semen found in store yogurt sample

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - A customer at an Albuquerque supermarket insisted last week that there was something gross in a yogurt sample an employee gave her while she was shopping.

Turns out she was right.

An Albuquerque police source said a Greek yogurt sample a Sunflower Market employee handed a customer was tainted with semen.

"I completely think it is disgusting," one customer said.

"Foul, beyond words," said another customer said walking out of the supermarket on Corrales Road and Alameda in Northwest Albuquerque Friday night.

Police got the test results earlier this week and told News 13 on Friday, the yogurt handed out by Anthony Garcia, 31, during his shift at the supermarket did in fact have semen in it.

"Absolutely disgusting; there is no way to justify that on any level," customer Keith Powell said.

The woman who filed the complaint said two employees at Sunflower were pointing at her when she was shopping with her daughter last week, according a police report. She said soon after, Garcia approached her in the cereal aisle offering up a Greek yogurt sample. The woman tried the yogurt, spit it out, and called police. She told police it was "gross" and "tasted like semen." Police collected and tested the sample the woman spit out.

According to the police report, the store manager said she was "not aware that any of her employees were sampling items on the sales floor" that day.

Garcia, who has worked at Sunflower Market for more than a year, told police he did hand out the samples to several people. He said he often does that to help boost sales, but denies that he added anything to the yogurt.

Garcia has not been charged in this case, but police took him away in handcuffs last week for failing to show up to court on child molestation charges. Police did get a DNA sample from Garcia on Friday and plan to test it against the semen found in the yogurt. Detectives said they hope to have those results back by sometime next week.

"I am so appalled," customer Sheila Olson said. "I cant imagine anyone doing that, I mean imagine little kids that may have sampled it."

Albuquerque police said it is talking with the Food and Drug Administration about possible federal food tampering charges. Police said whoever did this could also face battery charges under state law, which is only a misdemeanor.

News 13 repeatedly called and emailed Sunflower Market's Phoenix-based corporate office Friday afternoon for comment, but they did not return the calls for a response.