A decade of rodent findings came before a court shut a Minneapolis warehouse
Sept. 23, 2026 — State and federal inspectors documented rodent problems at Gold Star Distribution's Minneapolis warehouse for more than a decade before a federal court barred it from handling FDA-regulated products on Sept. 21. The Minnesota Department of Agriculture inspected the facility 26 times from 2013 to 2025, and the FDA five times before 2025; many of those inspections cited live and dead rodents, droppings and gnawed packaging.
The turn came in late 2025. After a Nov. 18 FDA inspection counted nine live and 17 dead rodents and eight live birds, the state twice embargoed the warehouse's food and revoked its wholesale license, the state pharmacy board ordered it to stop warehousing over-the-counter drugs without a required license, and the company recalled everything it held.
Under the consent decree, which the company and its owner, Bassam Abu Samrah, accepted without contesting, they must hire an independent expert, remove all pests, renovate, destroy their inventory and pass inspections before reopening. No public comment from the company was found.
The wall: The dates of individual inspections before 2025 were not given in the FDA's announcement or the consent decree.
Tier: Confirmed (based on the FDA's announcement and the consent decree, not the court docket)
Corrections
- Corrected Oct. 3, 2026: the notes on what this story is based on and what remains unknown were revised for clarity. The facts are unchanged.
Sources
- FDA press announcement, Sept. 23, 2026
- Modern Distribution Management (complaint details)
- VitalLaw (decree terms)
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