POMPANO BEACH, FL. State inspectors ordered Las Carnitas Latin Cuisine at 3305 N Federal Hwy shut down on July 17 after finding roach and fly activity inside the restaurant, triggering the facility's fourth emergency closure since 2021.
Inspectors also cited improperly cleaned and sanitized food contact surfaces as a high-priority violation during the same visit. That finding, combined with active pest activity, was enough to pull the restaurant's operating status and order the premises vacated by July 18.
What Inspectors Found
Las Carnitas: Emergency Closure History
The July 17 inspection turned up four high-priority violations and three intermediate violations. One of those high-priority citations was for food contact surfaces not properly cleaned or sanitized, a finding that inspectors classify as a direct cross-contamination risk.
The restaurant was allowed to reopen the following morning at 9:05 a.m. after a follow-up inspection on July 18 found only one remaining high-priority violation and no intermediate violations.
What This Violation Means
Roach and fly activity inside a food service operation is one of the conditions Florida regulators treat as an immediate public health threat, serious enough to close a restaurant on the spot without a warning period. Insects move between waste, drains, raw food and finished plates, carrying pathogens including Salmonella and E. coli on their bodies and depositing them on surfaces customers' food will touch.
The second high-priority citation, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, compounds that risk. Cutting boards, prep tables and utensils that are not properly sanitized between uses become direct transfer points for bacteria from one food item to the next. When pest activity and contaminated contact surfaces exist in the same kitchen at the same time, the potential for bacterial transfer to a customer's plate is not theoretical.
Together, these two violation types represent the kind of overlapping failures that regulators flag as requiring immediate action rather than a scheduled correction window.
The Longer Record
This closure was not a sudden or isolated finding. Across 34 inspections on record, Las Carnitas has accumulated 232 total violations, and the most recent two years of inspection data show elevated high-priority counts at nearly every visit.
In February 2024, inspectors documented 10 high-priority violations and 4 intermediate violations in a single visit, the steepest single-inspection total in the recent record. That was followed by 6 high-priority violations in July 2024 and 5 more in October 2024. By July 2025, inspectors returned to find 7 high-priority violations in one visit, prompting a follow-up inspection the next day that still found 1 high-priority violation remaining.
The pest problem at this address has a documented history that predates the current run of inspections. State records show the restaurant was emergency-closed on July 15, 2021 for fly activity and reopened the following day. It was shut down again on September 16, 2021, also for fly activity, and reopened again the next day. This week's closure for roach and fly activity marks the third time in five years that pest conditions at this location have risen to the level of an emergency shutdown.
The Pattern
What the inspection record shows, across five years and 34 visits, is a facility that has repeatedly corrected violations quickly enough to reopen, then returned to conditions that produce high-priority citations at the next inspection.
The July 2021 and September 2021 closures were both resolved within 24 hours. The July 2026 closure was resolved the next morning. Each time, the restaurant met the minimum standard required to reopen. Each time, high-priority violations reappeared at the following inspection.
The February 2024 visit, with its 10 high-priority violations, stands as the single worst inspection in the recent data. That it was followed by six more inspections over the next two and a half years, each still producing multiple high-priority citations, is the detail the record makes hardest to set aside.
As of the July 18 follow-up, Las Carnitas had been cleared to reopen. One high-priority violation remained on the books from that follow-up inspection.
