A man who owned a raw milk creamery behind the deaths of two people has been sentenced to probation. U.S.

Magistrate Judge Therese Wiley Dancks in New York sentenced Johannes Vulto on July 9 to three years probation, a $100,000 fine and 240 hours of community service. Vulto and his company pleaded guilty in March to causing the introduction of adulterated food into interstate commerce, a misdemeanor, prosecutors from the U.S.

Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of New York said in a news release. Vulto’s raw milk cheese was found to be the source of Listeria monocytogenes that sickened eight people, killing two of them in 2016. He could have been sentenced to up to a year in prison.

According to a plea agreement, he agreed to pay a $100,000 fine. According to court papers, Vulto started producing and shipping raw milk cheese from his creamery in Walton in 2012. The Food and Drug Administration reported that swabs taken from the creamery repeatedly tested positive for listeria species between July 2014 and February 2017, according to Vulto’s plea agreement.

Prosecutors said that raw milk cheese is 112 times more likely to cause listeriosis than pasteurized cheese. In 2018, the federal court shut down the Walton, NY, creamery. Judge Sannes permanently enjoined Vulto Creamery LLC and its owner, Vulto, from any further manufacturing or distribution of food.

Court documents say that in the aftermath of the deadly outbreak, federal officials concluded that Vulto lacke.