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Investigation: raw milk vendor lightly punished after child nearly died

scienceSep 30, 202664232

Emily Marris watched her 17-month-old daughter, Brooklyn, lie on a ventilator after doctors linked the toddler’s severe E. coli infection to unpasteurized raw goat milk sold by an unlicensed California farm. Marris had bought the milk after a chiropractor recommended the farm in a Facebook group; months of her text messages showed the farmer knew a toddler was drinking the milk yet continued to advertise it as “raw goat milk from a clean tested herd.” A 6-year-old who drank milk from the same source was hospitalized at the same San Diego hospital and required blood transfusions. California regulators found the dairy was operating off the state’s roster of about a dozen licensed raw-milk farms, selling unlabeled gallons in violation of state law that authorizes fines up to $10,000 and up to a year in jail for unlicensed sales. Investigators from at least four state and county agencies worked the case, with the California Department of Food and Agriculture taking the lead and using an undercover message on June 17, 2025, to confirm the farm sold milk by the gallon. The outbreak joins hundreds of illnesses across nine states in the past two years tied to raw milk and underscores how black-market dairies persist despite California’s licensing, inspection and labeling rules.

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