Italian restaurant closed for the night after inspector found too many roaches to count

Restaurant Report Card

JACKSONVILLE, Fla – A Mandarin Italian restaurant was closed for the night after the inspector found roaches all around a cooler.  It's back open but a manager says the problem was very serious and someone had to go. Ian MacDonald said the owner cut ties with a business partner.  

This all started when the inspector wrote he first saw one roach run under the reach in cooler at Benito's Pizza and Pastabilities on San Jose.  He looked further and said he found too many bugs to count after he pulled out that cooler. He started counting and uncovered dozens of bugs.

One of the employees said off camera there have been some big changes since the last inspection.  


The inspector noted more than 20 live roaches were underneath the reach in cooler, 5 live roaches were in back of the reach in cooler, 10 were on the wall and another one was under the cutting board.  The inspector wrote the manager and another employee started to kill them.  

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The state shut down Benito's on San Jose for the night so it could bring in an exterminator and eliminate the problem for good.

The restaurant was able to open back up the next day with zero high priority violations.  After our visit Ian MacDonald, who's a manager at the Mandarin Benito's, called to discuss the problem more in detail.
 
"The original owner Benito hired on a second partner who canceled pest control all together and was making bad decisions," says MacDonald.

He said Benito took the business back 2 weeks ago and now they have pest control scheduled for two to three times a month.
 
He also apologized to his customers.

"We've gone through a rough time but now they're back strong," says MacDonald.
 


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Anchor on The Morning Show team and reporter specializing on health issues.