[link to en.wikipedia.org]

Toxicity

The metabolism of amygdalin produces hydrogen cyanide, a potent toxin. Beta-glucosidase, one of the enzymes that catalyzes the release of cyanide from amygdalin, is present in human small intestine and in a variety of common foods. This leads to an unpredictable and potentially lethal toxicity when amygdalin or laetrile is taken orally.[10][18][19] Ingestion of purified amygdalin or apricot seeds can cause severe toxicity and death due to cyanide poisoning.[14] Numerous case reports in the medical literature describe serious cyanide poisoning in patients who ingested laetrile as a cancer treatment.[7][20] Blood cyanide concentrations may be measured as a means of confirming the diagnosis in hospitalized patients or to assist in the forensic investigation of a fatal overdose.[21]

Some laetrile promoters have claimed that the cyanide generated by laetrile is harmlessly detoxified by the mitochondrial enzyme rhodanese. However, these claims are false, as regardless of the level of rhodanese present, the body's available stores of cystine, cysteine, and other sulfates necessary to detoxify cyanide are rapidly depleted in laetrile poisoning.[7]














U.S. Department of Justice
United States Attorney -- Eastern District of New York
One Pierrepont Plaza
Brooklyn, New York 11201

Mailing Address:
147 Pierrepont St.
Brooklyn NY 11201

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 22, 2003

Peggy Long, U.S. Attorney's Office:
718-254-6267
Jason Brodsky, FDA Office of Public Affairs:
301-827-6242

President of Queens Firm Found Guilty of Criminal Contempt For Violating Court Order Not to Market Bogus Cancer Cure Over the Internet

ROSLYNN R. MAUSKOPF , United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and MARK B. McCLELLAN , M.D., Ph.D., Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), announced today that a federal jury in Brooklyn, New York has convicted Jason Vale, president of the Queens based company Christian Brothers Contracting Corporation ("Christian Bros."), of three counts of criminal contempt in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 401(3). On April 20, 2000, in a civil suit brought by the United States against Vale and his company Christian Bros., the Honorable John Gleeson entered a preliminary injunction ordering Vale and Christian Bros., during the pendency of the civil suit, not to directly or indirectly sell, distribute, package, label, or promote Laetrile., also known as amygdalin, "Vitamin B-17," or apricot pits. On November 16, 2000, Judge Gleeson ended the civil suit by permanently ordering Vale and Christian Bros. not to sell, distribute, package, label, or promote Laetrile. For years before the civil suit was brought, Vale, through Christian Bros., had sold Laetrile over the Internet in order to cure and prevent cancer, having saturated the public with a massive Internet and "spam" E-mailing marketing campaign which guaranteed persons a cancer free life if they used his products. Laetrile is not approved as a drug for the treatment and prevention of cancer and evidence introduced during the civil suit demonstrated that Laetrile has no known effect on cancer and that it is highly toxic, breaking down in the human body into cyanide gas. Moreover, when cancer patients take Laetrile they often forego conventional medical therapies until it is too late for these therapies to be effective. An undercover investigation conducted by the United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York and by FDA's Office of Criminal Investigations demonstrated that Vale set up a shell corporation in Arizona through which he continued to sell Laetrile in complete disregard for the Court's injunctions. Although Vale announced over the Internet that he had stopped selling Laetrile because the court had ordered him not to sell it, he continued to tout Laetrile as a cure for cancer and further announced that there were other companies that still sold it. If customers called Christian Bros. and tried to purchase Laetrile, Vale and his employees told them that, although Christian Bros. no longer sold Laetrile, the customers could purchase Laetrile from a wholly unrelated company at a toll free number which he and his employees gave to them. The undercover investigation demonstrated that the toll free number rang inside Vale's own house and that Vale would send the Laetrile to customers from his house under the name of his Arizona shell corporation. Vale and his employees would stamp a Phoenix Arizona "return address" on these outgoing packages which was in fact nothing more than a mailbox which was rented in Phoenix Arizona with Vale's own credit card.

A search warrant executed at the defendant's house during the undercover investigation demonstrated that after the preliminary injunction the defendant had stored in his basement ready to be shipped to customers around the world enough Laetrile to supply a single person for over 242 years.

The jury announced the guilty verdicts on July 21, 2003, following the conclusion of a week long trial. During the trial, supporters of Vale had handed out leaflets to persons who entered the courthouse, including a number of the jurors who were deciding the contempt case against Vale. The leaflet told jurors that they had a constitutional right to ignore the evidence and the Court's instructions if they so chose. This incident was one of the factors taken into consideration by Judge Gleeson in ordering Vale held without bail pending his sentencing.

United States Attorney ROSLYNN R. MAUSKOPF stated that "This office will not tolerate any disregard for the lawful orders of this Court. Nor will it tolerate fraud, especially when it foists dangerous products on a vulnerable public."

Commissioner McCLELLAN stated that "The FDA takes seriously its responsibility to protect patients from unproven products being peddled on the internet by modern day snake oil salesmen such as the defendant in this case. There is no scientific evidence that Laetrile offers anything but false hope to cance patients."

United States Attorney ROSALYNN R. MAUSKOPF wishes to thank the Office of Criminal Investigations of the Food and Drug Administration for its unstinting efforts to investigate this matter and assist in its prosecution. Sentencing is scheduled for October 24, 2003 at 2:00 p.m., before United States District Court Judge John Gleeson in Brooklyn. The government's case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Charles S. Kleinberg and Patricia Pileggi. Marc L. Caden, Associate Chief Counsel to for Enforcement, is assigned to the case from the FDA.

Defendants

Name: Jason Vale
DOB: 1968
Residence: 82-50 235th Street
Bellrose Manor, New York 11427

Name: Christian Bros. Contracting Corp.
Bus. Add: 82-50 235th Street,
Bellrose Manor, New York 11427