Live scorpion found in bag of spinach, couple claims

LANDOVER, Md. — A Maryland couple contacted a grocery store chain after they said they opened a bag of store-brand spinach on Monday and found a live scorpion.

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"The fact that it's in a spinach bag, a typical washed spinach bag, makes me so concerned," Shanmukha Pranay Rajeev Jerripothula told WMAR.

Jerripothula's wife, Sri Sindhusha Boddapati, found the unexpected arachnid Monday when she opened a bag of spinach that was bought Friday from the Giant Food store in Landover, WRC-TV reported.

“I saw something inside the bag, crawling,” she told the news station. “I thought it was a cricket in the beginning.”

Boddapati was able to get the creature into a water bottle and discovered that it was a scorpion, according to WRC-TV. Jerripothula later took the bottle to the Giant store.

“I told them not to sell the spinach anymore, because it might contain a scorpion,” Jerripothula told WRC-TV.

The store pulled its store-brand spinach off shelves a few hours after Jerripothula’s visit, according to the news station.

In a statement released to WJLA, Giant Food of Landover said it's working with its supplier to prevent similar incidents.

"Customer satisfaction is our highest priority,” the statement said. “We regret any inconvenience to our customer. We take the quality of our products very seriously and we are following up with the supplier to take every step to ensure this isolated incident does not occur in the future."

Cox Media Group