RALEIGH, N.C. AP – A North Carolina syringe factory linked to hundreds of sicknesses and five deaths operated for almost two years without an inspection despite a series of complaints that its needles were dirty or filled with colored particles.

Court documents in the North Carolina case show the U.S. Food and Drug Administration only inspected the AM2PAT Inc. plant in December 2007 after an outbreak of illness was reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.