Judge Amends Order in Rice Farmers’ Case
by March 7, 2013 11:38 am 94 views
Chief judge Brian S. Miller has issued an amended order and judgment in a lawsuit filed by a group of four Arkansas farmers that targeted some of the state’s largest poultry companies.
The lawsuit, filed last year, alleged the defendants — including Tyson Foods Inc., George’s Inc., Simmons Foods Inc. and Peterson Farms Inc. — “knew that excessive arsenic in chicken litter used as fertilizer on many rice farms in Arkansas would contaminate the entire U.S. rice crop and infiltrate the general U.S. rice supply.”
The suit also claimed publicity regarding the contamination “would result in devastating financial losses to U.S. and Arkansas rice producers.”
On Tuesday, Miller, who works in the U.S. District Court in Pine Bluff, dismissed the suit with prejudice. On Thursday, however, he amended his order and judgment “to dismiss the case without prejudice as specified in the plaintiffs’ collective motion to dismiss.”
Having the case dismissed “without prejudice” means the plaintiffs, represented by the Alabama-based firm of Hare Wynn Newell & Newton LLP, can re-file it within 12 months. A source familiar with the case, however, said that scenario is unlikely.
Each party in the suit also will “bear its own costs, attorneys’ fees and expenses,” according to Miller’s amended order and judgment.
The defendants disputed the allegations from the get-go, and the Arkansas Rice Federation stated publicly it did not support the suit.
“We appreciate the court’s decision to dismiss this case,” Tyson Foods director of public relations Gary Mickelson wrote Tuesday in an emailed statement. “As we said last year, this lawsuit is an example of frivolous litigation designed to extract money from companies that have done nothing wrong. None of our chickens are given feed additives containing arsenic.”