Austria arrests man suspected of lacing baby food with rat poison

Austrian police have arrested a man suspected of lacing jars of baby food with rat poison in what authorities presumed was an extortion scheme.

Police, cited by the APA news agency, said the suspect, aged 39, was apprehended in the state of Burgenland, south of Vienna. They did not name him nor say where exactly he was arrested.

He was charged with deliberately causing a public danger and attempted grievous bodily harm.

The arrest comes two weeks after Austrian authorities detected rat poison in baby food jars sold in some supermarkets. The jars were made by the German-based company HiPP, and German police became involved in the case.

Five tampered jars were recovered before they were consumed in the following days in Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Police said they believed the crime was carried out to extort the company, which put out a product recall in Austria.

One of the adulterated jars was bought in a Spar supermarket in Burgenland state, in the city of Eisenstadt. It was found to contain 15 microgrammes of rat poison.

Another jar sold in the same supermarket was suspected to have also been laced with poison, but it has not yet been recovered.