Mum horrified to find pin concealed in strawberry from Barkingside Sainsbury’s

Sainsbury's said it is urgently investigating the incident. The strawberries were bought at the Barkingside store in Tanners Lane on Monday, January 13.

Sarah Mackie, 35, of Loughton, gave half the strawberries to her boys on Monday evening and put the remaining fruit in the fridge.

The area around the pin appeared to be rotting so Sarah thinks the pin had been in there for some time. Picture: Sarah Mackie (Image: Archant)

On Tuesday when she went to cut the last strawberry she was horrified to discover there was a pin neatly stuck inside it.

Sarah told the Recorder: "I was shocked at first and then I got really angry.

"How does a pin perfectly embed itself in the middle of a strawberry? Why would someone want to harm a complete stranger?"

Luckily Sarah discovered the needle before giving the strawberry to her twins. She said the package didn't appear to be damaged or tampered with.

She called Sainsbury's who told her to return the fruit to the store so it could look into the matter but she wasn't happy staff didn't take down her information in case they needed more details about what happened.

She emailed the chief executive and Sainsbury's told her it is taking the matter very seriously and would get back to her within four weeks with its findings.

The store told her it appeared to be an isolated incident,

After inspecting the tainted fruit Sarah noticed that the area around the pin had started to rot which makes her suspect it had been sitting in there for some time.

She said there was no sign of anything sticking out of the fruit since the pin appeared to be inserted in the stem and was covered by the leafs.

She posted pictures of the incident on Facebook to warn people to be vigilant in case any other fruit has been tampered with.

"My main concern is to let people know so they can be careful and prevent any injuries. I don't know if it's a one-off thing or something more sinister."