The Salt Lake Valley Health Department confirmed Wednesday it is investigating an illness — suspected to be foodborne botulism — in 12 inmates of the Utah State Prison.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports eight inmates, three of whom are in critical condition, are receiving treatment at a local hospital, and four are under medical observation at the prison.

All the affected inmates consumed home-made alcohol brewed inside a cell at the prison, according to a health department news release.

The inmates affected likely came in contact with the bacteria by drinking brew, alcohol made in a cell, apparently in a plastic bag. Inmates often use fruit, water and sugar to craft the brew, which they often hide in the cell’s toilet, and when those foods are in an anaerobic environment they can create a breeding ground for the bacteria.

According to confiscation reports obtained earlier this year by The Tribune, brew is made fairly frequently, with 44 confiscations of the substance occurring between October 2009 and December 2010. However, the prison has not ever had a case of botulism, according to Nicholas Rupp, public information officer for the health department.

But "there’s always a health risk any time there is inappropriate food handling," Rupp added.

The Brits do have a way with words. From today’s issue of The Sun:

Rapists, paedophiles, a killer and drug-dealers may pocket £300,000 after prison sarnies gave them food poisoning.

A group of 164 inmates were all poleaxed after eating egg and cress rolls infected with salmonella.

Their lawyers have filed a High Court claim demanding £1,800 compensation for each convict for "pain, suffering and loss of amenity".

They are almost certain to get some money because the Ministry of Justice has admitted kitchen staff at South London's Wandsworth Prison failed to cook the eggs properly.

A Whitehall source said: "There is no doubt that compensation will be paid, but the amount of money the prisoners are after will be contested vigorously. There will be very little public sympathy for this."

And now, a message from Julian Assange:

I’ve screwed up. I’ve done time. Maybe not enough, that’s another discussion.

With Peanut Corporation of America CEO Stewart Parnell back in the nut business after killing 9 and sickening 700, there’s a move afoot for stricter penalties for those who knowingly market unsafe food.

BBC News reports that Ramazan Aslan, the former owner of some hole-in0the-wall takeaway in Walse that was the likely source of an E. coli outbreak that sickened four, will face charges in court.

He will face a number of food hygiene offences.

The National Public Health Service for Wales said in 2009 that the Llay Fish Bar, Llay - now operating under new ownership - was the likely source.

Four people, including a three-year-old girl, had the same strain of E.coli after buying food from the premises in July last year.

William Perry, aka The Tipton Slasher, was the bare-knuckle heavyweight boxing champ of England in 1850 and 1856.

Apparently, I am related, through my father’s father’s family.

You can see it in the profile (left).

I figured this out during a grade 8 genealogy project in 1975.

Now that Al Gore has invented the Internet, I looked on-line, and there are lots of purported relatives of The Tipton Slasher.

But I have a collection of newspaper clippings outlining the alcohol-fueled antics – and downfall – of the Slasher, as well as a copy of the 1959 Pictorial History of Boxing, by Nat Fleicher and Sam Andre, passed through the family to me.

Hey, the Slasher’s even got his own wiki page.

“William Perry (21 March 1819 – 18 January 1881), known as the Tipton Slasher, was an English boxer of the bare-knuckle era.

“Born Tipton, Perry claimed the heavyweight boxing championship of England twice, in 1850 and in 1856. He was finally defeated by Tom Sayers in 1857.

“He died in Wolverhampton aged 62. A statue stands in the town of Tipton, yards away from the Fountain Inn public house, which was once his headquarters. The building received Grade II Listed Building Status in 1984 on recognition of its association with Perry, who regularly fought fellow boatmen on the many local canals in order to be first through the lockgates.”

Another site described great-great-great-great-great uncle Perry as possessing average physical skills but was “tricky, cool under pressure and used good judgment.”

Except when he bet everything he owned, including his bar, on a comeback title match for which he was woefully underprepared and lost everything, returning to work the canals and dying, penniless and drunk.

Cool statue though.

When they’re not bare-knuckle boxing in British prisons – I wonder which inmate has insisted on the nickname, The Tipton Slasher -- they’re drinking alcohol-based sanitizers.

Peter McParlin of the Prison Officers Association says inmates were using hand sanitizer distributed to control H1N1 flu,  to make illicit alcohol.

The gel had been distributed around the prison to stop the spread of the swine flu virus. McParlin said on Thursday that giving inmates access to a gel with an alcohol content was unwise.

The Tipton Slasher would approve.