quantum field theory - Is conservation of statistics logically independent of spin?

If the number of fermions is $n$, we expect the quantity $(-1)^n$ to be conserved, i.e., $n$ never changes between even and odd. This is known as conservation of statistics. In the normal context of particles with the properties traditionally expected for fermions and bosons, it can be derived from conservation of angular momentum. If $n$ were to change from, say, even to odd, then the total angular momentum of the system would have to change from an integer to a half-integer.

In the context of tachyons, there's an odd twist, however. The spin-statistics theorem is based on the assumption that the field has to commute at points that are spacelike in relation to one another. This commutation relation wouldn't hold for tachyons, so they get a free pass on spin-statistics. In fact Feinberg, in the classic paper that introduced the term "tachyon," found that the most plausible possibility was that tachyons would be spin-0 fermions (Feinberg 1967).

Feinberg says on p. 1099, discussing selection rules,

[...]there are restrictions following from the conservation of statistics. I shall simply assume here that if we assign a number $+1$ for bosons and $-1$ to fermions and multiply these numbers for a multiparticle system that these products are conserved in any transition.[16]

Footnote 16 says,

See, for example, Greenberg and Messiah (Ref. 10) where this is proven, however, under assumptions that may be invalid for tachyon theories.

Given Feinberg's assumption, we have two separate conservation laws, conservation of statistics and conservation of angular momentum, and the result is that if tachyons are unique in combining integer spin with Fermi statistics, they have a special conservation law that only applies to them: if $t$ is the number of tachyons, then $(-1)^t$ is conserved. This means, for example, that you can't produce just one tachyon, and you also can't have a process that produces a tachyon plus an electron, even though in normal field theory it's perfectly OK to produce two unlike fermions.

Does conservation of statistics really have some independent logical status, or is Feinberg just making an assumption that could be false, but that might make the field theory he's constructing easier to work with or more familiar? The understanding of tachyons in QFT has progressed a lot since 1967, so I wonder if this issue is better understood today than it was then.

G. Feinberg, "Possibility of Faster-Than-light Particles". Phys. Rev. 159 no. 5 (1967) 1089. Copy available here (may be illegal, or may fall under fair use, depending on your interpretation of your country's laws).