LOS ANGELES — The hamburger chains Jack in the Box and In-N-Out as well more than 150 school districts around the nation, including TUSD, have banned meat from a Chino slaughterhouse after a video showed workers brutalizing sick and crippled cows, officials said Friday.
The New York City public school system — the nation's largest with 1.1 million students — pulled all hamburgers from its menus.
School districts in at least 11 states have stopped using ground beef from Hallmark Meat Packing Co. and its associated Westland Meat Co. until a federal investigation is complete.
The Tucson Unified School District has purchased several thousand cases of beef patty products and beef-and-bean burrito products that originated from the Westland Slaughter Co. since Jan. 1, 2007.
Upon receiving notification on Jan. 31 of the ban, the district immediately checked inventory and began planning substitutions for meals containing any of those products, according to a news release.
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The district is looking into other suppliers of beef patties, the release said.
Inspectors were at the packing plant on Friday, USDA spokeswoman Angela Harless said. No illnesses linked to the beef have been reported.
Jack in the Box, which has restaurants in 18 states, told its meat suppliers not to use Hallmark until further notice, spokeswoman Kathleen Anthony said.
"We definitely have very strict animal-welfare guidelines that we expect our suppliers to follow," she said.
The San Diego-based company does not purchase meat directly from slaughterhouses, so it was unclear whether it had used any Hallmark meat, she said.
In-N-Out, an Irvine-based chain, also halted use of the beef, saying it would never condone the inhumane treatment of animals.
Hallmark did not immediately return a call seeking comment Friday. Westland President Steve Mendell said earlier in the week that the company was "shocked, saddened and sickened" by the video, had fired two workers shown in it and suspended their supervisor.
Westland sold more than 27 million pounds of beef last year for use in school lunch and other federal nutrition programs.
McDonald's Corp., the world's largest fast-food chain, said it does not do business with the slaughterhouse. Burger King, based in Miami, said it does not buy beef from the packing house and has "no connection to the supplier."
The videotape released Wednesday by The Humane Society of the United States showed slaughterhouse employees kicking, shocking, dragging and otherwise abusing "downer" cows — those believed too sick or injured to walk.
The group urged Congress to pass bills requiring downed animals to be killed humanely and barred from being slaughtered for human consumption.
USDA regulations already prohibit use of disabled cows for human food because they may pose a higher risk of illnesses such as mad-cow disease.
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