POM Wonderful Vice-President Resigns Under Siege

For Immediate Release
January 4, 2007


LOS ANGELES - In an email to the North American Animal Liberation Press Office last week, POM Wonderful's new public relations firm Sitrick and Company announced from Century City California that Vice President Fiona Posell has decided to resign and "pursue other interests." Because the company engages in animal testing in order to make health claims about pomegranate juice, POM has seen legal demonstrations at the homes of its executives in Los Angeles as well as recent claims alleging product tampering on the East Coast, where an anonymous communique stated that 487 bottles of POM juice had been tainted.
(full communique at http://www.animalliberationpressoffice.org/communiques/2006-12-14_pom.htm)

The Press Office has also received information from the National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Better Business Bureau, which has recommended POM Wonderful discontinue its "puffery" and hyperbolic health claims regarding its pomegranate juice. NAD Director Andrea Levine reported that the claims were the strongest she'd ever seen for a food product; yet POM continues to make outrageous claims that its juice benefits cancer, heart disease, and Alzheimer's.

Two inexplicable animal experiments which originally alerted People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) involved POM personnel placing newborn mice in oxygen-deficient chambers to induce brain damage and severing the penile arteries of rabbits in order to claim that POM juice oxygenates tissues and cures erectile dysfunction.

In its own Press Release, POM states that Ms. Possell cites animal rights activists as the reason for her resignation - but there appear to be obvious professionally obligations to avoid embarrassing the company with an admission that her conscience will no longer tolerate complicity in animal abuse.

Press Officer Lindy Greene states, "When compassionate activists legally exercise their constitutional rights to demonstrate and speak freely in order to educate the public about a company's immoral business practices, its executives often see the light and make the ethical choice to leave its employ. I congratulate Ms. Posell on recognizing that vivisection and fruit juice are an immiscible combination and wishes her well in her future endeavors, hopefully working for a company that is more ethical and moral."