Petition Filed to Dismiss Triumph Foods from Class-action Antitrust Suit against Meat Processors

The plaintiffs in the class-action antitrust lawsuit against numerous meat and poultry processors have petitioned the court to dismiss their case against St. Joseph, Mo.-based pork processor Triumph Foods, according to a release shared with Food Processing.

The lawsuit, Brown et al v. JBS USA Food Company et al, was filed in November 2022 in the U.S. District Court of Colorado, and claims that pork and beef companies have, “conspired and combined to fix and depress the compensation paid to employees at red meat processing plants in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act.” Aside from JBS and Triumph, a dozen other beef and pork companies and their subsidiaries are named as defendants, including Tyson, Cargill, Hormel, American Foods Group, Seaboard Foods, Smithfield and others.

Plaintiffs requested that the court dismiss with prejudice all claims against Triumph, which is unique because of its uniqueness as one of the only farmer-owned pork processors in the U.S. Triumph processes pork for its farmers and does not directly market nor sell its pork products. Triumph has agreed to cooperate with plaintiffs as they continue their legal action against the remaining defendants in the lawsuit.