Miky’s Italian Fusion owner fined after girls served citronella instead of juice

Miky's Italian Fusion closed after two girls were served insect repellent. Photo / Google Maps

An Australian restaurant has been fined A$40,000 ($47,700) after accidentally serving insect repellent to children.

Hannah Lemin, 12, and Olivia, 11, ordered cranberry juice at the now closed Miky’s Italian Fusion restaurant in Perth, while out to dinner with their parents in 2024, reported the ABC.

“My daughters just went to gulp it down, and they both spat the cranberry juice out and said, ‘It’s poisoned’,” the daughters’ mother, Michele Lemin, told the ABC.

“I said, ‘Don’t be silly,’ and took the glass, and I went to gulp it down and then spat it out.”

Father Marcus Lemin said he ran to the bar and demanded to see the bottle the staff had used.

He told the ABC staff initially declined to show him saying it was “just old cranberry juice”.

He demanded to see it and said: “No, you need to give me the bottle, I need to see what it is”.

They discovered the bartender had served the children citronella torch and lamp oil – a common insect repellent.

The parents contacted the poison information centre then rushed the children to hospital.

Marcus Lemin said the citronella made his daughters’ stomachs burn, heads ache and fingers and hands tingle.

“It was awful,” he told the ABC.

After the poisoning, the Department of Health got involved which sparked an investigation. The restaurant’s former owner, Michele Angiuli, was sentenced in a Perth Magistrates Court on Tuesday.

The court heard Angiuli did not have a food safety officer, had a disordered bar and “failed to act with due diligence”, reported the Sydney Morning Herald.

Angiuli pleaded not guilty to failing to comply with food standard codes, arguing he could not be held responsible for the act of his bartender.

The magistrate disagreed and fined Angiuli and his company A$20,000 ($23,870) each.

In the decision, they said Angiuli’s restaurant “was not appropriately managed or compliant in a few areas”, that he lied to food safety officers and “attempted to cast the blame onto his employees”.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported Angiuli told the court he was forced to close his restaurant after the negative publicity and no longer worked in the trade despite his love for hospitality.

The magistrate said the situation could have ended disastrously.

“The children were young,” the magistrate told Angiuli, reported the Sydney Morning Herald.

“But for the fact it was citronella and it tasted disgusting and they spat it out immediately, the consequences could have been more serious.”