The house that once served as headquarters for Peanut Corporation of America is no longer owned by Stewart and Gloria Parnell. The five-bedroom house with four fireplaces site on five acres and has brick patios and walkways with wide planked Arkansas pine floors. It was acquired through foreclosure by American National Bank and Trust Co. in Danville, VA, for $325,000.
The property was listed for sale by the Parnells April 23, 2015, for $699,000 without success. The Danville bank acquired the property at 2121 Wiggingtton Road on Jan. 27, just one day after the federal district court in Albany, GA, held a restitution hearing involving Stewart Parnell, his brother Michael Parnell, and two former PCA managers. U.S. District Judge W. Louis Sands has not yet ruled on restitution. The house, located in the Boonsboro area of Bedford County, VA, was custom built. While the house did not fetch the price the Parnells were asking during eight months on the market, its Zillow Zestimate today is $612,814. Whatever the value, its now gone to the bank and won’t be available for restitution.
The Parnells built the Cape Cod style house with gabled roof in 1986. The land and improvements were last assessed by Bedford County at $452,800. It was from this house just outside Lynchburg, VA, that the owner and chief executive of Peanut Corporation of America gave orders to those running peanut processing plants in Texas, Georgia and Virginia. When the house was listed for sale last year, Parnell was waiting to be sentenced on multiple fraud and conspiracy counts stemming from the investigation into the 2008-09 Salmonella outbreak that was associated with products produced at the PCA plant in Blakely, GA. This past Sept. 21, Parnell was sentenced to 28 years in prison for the multiple federal felonies. He is serving his time at the federal correctional facility at Estill, SC. PCA went bankrupt shortly after the outbreak that resulted in nine deaths and sickened thousands nationwide. Parnell’s brother, Michael Parnell, and three others were also convicted in the PCA criminal case. Michael Parnell was sentenced to 20 years. (To sign up for a free subscription to Food Safety News, click here.)
