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Fruity health claims by ex-Delco billionaires 'false': FTC

Owners Stewart and Lynda Resnick and Matthew Tupper "violated federal law" with "deceptive" claims

Pomegranate juice won't really "prevent or treat heart disease, prostate cancer, and erectile dysfunction," and owners Stewart and Lynda Resnick and Matthew Tupper of California-based POM Wonderful LLC and Roll Corp. "violated federal law by making deceptive disease prevention and treatment claims," says the Federal Trade Commission here.

"The ads in question appeared in national publications such as Parade, Fitness, The New York Times, and Prevention magazines; on Internet sites such as pomtruth.com, pomwonderful.com, and pompills.com; on bus stops and billboards; in newsletters to customers; and on tags attached to the product."

The Resnicks, former Philadelphians who owned Delaware County's Franklin Mint during the years of its decline (her father, Jack Harris, produced the original movie The Blob, shot partly in Phoenixville), and their fellow pomegranate promoters aren't backing down, but FTC says "Mark Dreher, POM Wonderful's former head of scientific and regulatory affairs and expert endorser, has agreed to a settlement that bars him from making any disease treatment or prevention claims in advertising for a POM Wonderful product," unless the claims are actually true. No immediate response from POM.