2 Investigators: Mail-Order Meat Company Stiffs Customers
(CBS) -- Rancid cuts of meat, or no meat at all. Hundreds of people claim they got caught up in a meat-buying scam.
CBS 2's Dave Savini investigated what seemed like a good idea: buy a whole or half pig or cow and have it prepared and shipped to your home.
However, hundreds of people began complaining the company, Alexander King Farms and run out of a now vacant Geneseo storefront, took their money but never shipped the meat.
Melissa Graham of Bloomingdale says she liked the idea of buying meat this way.
"We knew it would be fresh, no hormones, antibiotics," Graham says.
Instead of getting the meat, Graham says she lost $270.
"They stole money," she says. "They took something that they had no intention of providing services for."
Deborah and Tim Mc Farlin from Fox Lake lost $1230.
"I was embarrassed that I fell into it," says Deborah Mc Farlin, who, with her husband, ordered 300 pounds of meat they say was never delivered.
Alexander King Farms and company owner Beth Alexander also are accused of not paying vendors. Pig farm owner Tammy Milem said Alexander brought her pigs to Milem's farm for fattening and prepping for market.
Milem says Alexander then failed to pay what she owed – nearly $10,000.
The Illinois Attorney General's Office is investigating after receiving 297 complaints. A police investigation found the problems began in September 2015 and then got worse.
Customers say Alexander continued taking their money, then stopped taking their calls when it all collapsed.
Graham says she believes when Alexander asked her for a second payment, Alexander already knew her business was in trouble.
She and the Mc Farlins still hope to get their money back.
Hundreds more are trying from around the country, including in Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas, and Colorado.
Some people received what they ordered, but allegedly not always in good condition.
"The meat was showing up as raw," says Milem. "It was smelling it was going bad."
Milem says another problem was that Alexander brought sick pigs to her farm.
"We just tried to get her to take care of her animals, because we were watching them suffer and die," she says. "She lost roughly about 35 pigs. And then we lost about 30."
On Facebook, Milem is keeping track of what customers say they lost.
"We're looking at $369,000," she says.
The Henry County Sheriff's Department also launched an investigation and agrees losses could be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, but there is no final number yet.
Prosecutors are reviewing that case.
CBS 2 has tried unsuccessfully to reach Beth Alexander.