Getting Sued

[jtrotta]

Terrell

Now that you've opened pandora's box - I see said the blind man;

"The Bank is tied to the Poultry Company" -
sort of like the arm breaker is tied to the liquor delivery guys, during prohibition. I believe RICO falls into this catagory, where the possibility exists to extort the property by means of whatever action is necessary. In this instance the Lender is the controller via the "intergrator" as you put it.

Under the situation your now describing, you shouldn't be involved at all for any reason, not even under the Rico Act, your knowledge & appraisal will not support anything here. They're just wasting your time; you stated they made the loan before your report, and for more than 100% of the value, and why would they be worried, they have control of everything, including knowing exactly what their profit will be. It appears to be a sure fired "money machine"; look at it as a "Casino" - except you may never have to pay out, because it's even less of a risk.

Now that you've brought it up, this sounds like one hell of a way to make money and never sustain a loss. Here's a kicker, they forclose-claim a loss, get the farms back and resell at a huge profit next year, saving all of this years possible tax payouts. Once they claim it as a loss, they can write the loss out over three years, therefore, creating a larger in pocket profit over the next three year period; this may lead to an investigation by the IRS- 8O

8)

 

[David C. Johnson]

<span style='color:darkblue'>Terrel:

The following is an excerpt from Harvard Law Professor, Alan M. Dershowitz's "Contrary to Popular Opinion," a book he wrote in 1992 which covers his views on many legal issues. This particular section, which happens to address abortion, is actually on RICO. It may be of interest to some others on this forum also.</span>
______________

<span style='color:brown'>Misuse of RICO Law Punishes "Pro-Lifers"

Whatever else you can call antiabortion zealots who invade abortion clinics in an effort to prevent what they regard as "murder," the one word that does not seem to fit is "racketeer."

Yet under a vaguely worded 1970 federal statute called the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, several courts have ruled that antiabortion protesters who engage in civil disobedience may be declared to be "racketeers" and subject to the draconian provisions of RICO law. Now the Supreme Court has given this approach an apparent green light.

When Congress enacted RICO, with its criminal as well as civil provisions, it was plainly targeting "organized crime" committed for profit by "mobsters." Indeed, the major purpose behind the statue's harsh financial penalties, including multiple damages and forfeiture of assets, was to try to take the profit out of organized crime. In 1981, the Supreme Court recognized that the declared purpose of Congress in enacting the RICO statute was "to seek the eradication of organized crime in the United States."

But it is not easy to define "organized crime," "Mobster," or "racketeer" with precision, and what the late Justice Potter Stewart once said about ****ography is applicable: "Perhaps I could never succeed in [defining it]. But I know it when I see it, and the activity involving in this case is not that."

Congress, unable to define the evil it had in mind, drafted the RICO statute overbroadly to assure that no "racketeers" or "mobsters" escaped its remedies. It used terms such as "enterprise," "pattern of racketeering activity," and extortion."

Over the years, the terms took on definitions that expanded accordionlike to cover conduct never contemplated by the drafters of the original law. Corporations brought RICO suits against their competitors, including respected and legitimate businesses. Prosecutors used it to prosecute petty criminals, Wall Street traders, and corrupt politicians. By 1985, the Supreme Court acknowledged that RICO was being used primarily against defendants other than the archetypal intimidating mobster, and that it was evolving in to something quite different form the original conception of its enactors. But the Court declared itself helpless to remedy the situation, saying that any correction must lie with Congress.

But Congress has not acted, and the problem has gotten out of hand. Several months after the Supreme Court abdicated responsibility for narrowing the scope of RICO, the Northeast Women's Center, a Philadelphia abortion clinic, filed a RICO action against various antiabortion activists who had unlawfully entered the center, strewn medical supplies on the floor, harassed patients, blocked access to rooms and shoved some employees.

There can be no reasonable dispute that these violent actions were criminal in nature and were appropriately punishable under local trespass and assault statutes. They also caused damages to persons and property that could form the basis for a tort action. The real question, and one that had not been definitively decided by any federal court, was whether these criminal actions could be interpreted as "a pattern or racketeering" under the RICO statute.

Earlier this year, following a jury verdict against the antiabortion activists, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled that the RICO statute was fully applicable to disruptive conduct that is motivated by political beliefs rather than economic gain. It upheld the $108,000 verdict against the activists despite their claim that "civil disobedience" does not constitute racketeering.

More important than the monetary verdict, the decision invites other victims of politically motivated civil disobedience to unleash the nuclear weapon of RICO against their opponents, so as to bankrupt them and their adherents.

This decision set the stage for a possible confrontation before the Supreme Court. The defendants retained as their lawyer none other than the draftsman of the original RICO law, Professor G. Robert Blakey of Notre Dame Law School. If anyone could know what sort of conduct the law was supposed to cover and not cover, surely Blakey would. Blakey argued that under the court of appeals' extension of the law to politically motivated civil disobedience, "Martin Luther King was a racketeer when he trespassed on private property."

He might have added that antiwar protesters of the late 1960s who damaged draft offices and war-related businesses were also racketeers. And most pointedly, if abortion ever becomes illegal -- and I fervently hope it won't -- those women and men who will inevitably engage in unlawful civil disobedience to protest their lack of choice will see the seed they planted bear a poisonous fruit that will be used against them.

Last week the Supreme Court declined to review the Philadelphia case. It gave no reason, but it is fair to assume that it has once again placed the ball squarely in Congress's court. Congress can no longer remain silent in the face of this dangerous misapplication of a statute intended to address an entirely different sort of criminal conduct.

October 1989</span>
_________________

dcj

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

Actually the bank took a real hit of about $100,000. $258,000 mortgage, sold place for $150,000. The integrator depends upon # of chicken for its living. If grower A is selling 4.75# of bird the integrator is marketing at 60 cent/LB. and grower B is selling 4.33# birds at 60 cents you see the integrator is grossing 20,000 birds x 5 batches per year x .42# x 60 cents LESS under a poor grower than a good grower. After all the integrator still has X cents in each bird for hatching, delivering, etc. regardless how big they grow. This is about $20,000 per year for one house. The grower who underperforms thus has to share that "loss" by taking less in bonus (payment per pound). So under poor management the integrator loses money too. The relationship actually favors the grower. The bank will not be quick to repo and the grower cannot threaten to cut off the grower without the loan defaulting. And these loans are all in house, money backed by the Integrator owner NONE of these farms to my knowledge have one red cent from FSA or Freddy Mac, etc.

 

[David C. Johnson]

Terrel,

You may or may not have interest in reading some or all of this article. Same for others. Yep, I read it a couple of weeks ago after missing the Public Broadcasting Station (PBS) show on TV that I had wanted to see that was partly based on this investigative reporting / written documentary. The article does help explain a lot about the meat industry in the states. Many of the producers for beef and poultry are some of the same players including Tyson. BTW, wonder if Tyson was involved at all in this situation (they've sure had some problems in the past)?

POWER STEER (Warning: 8,900 Words Long & May be Boring)
<span style='color:darkblue'>
Information from this hyperlink forms part of the basis for a developing theory of mine (and of other peoples' I'm sure) regarding our collective reaction and resolve to relatively recent events and revelations in the states (e.g., Enron, Inc., FBI & Company, Inc., Lending & Appraising, Inc., Etcetera, Inc.). If the theory ever reaches essay form, the following might be a rough draft title and conclusion:

Fatal Failure of Modern American Men:
Our Increased Tolerance of the Intolerable in Business & Government Ethics

...To be crude about it, way overly simplistic about it, and maybe a little mean about it: We are becoming a nation of little girls. About half grow up to become fine young women -- progressing into a healthy, productive maturity; and the other half grow up to be little girls. While largely figurative, there may now be evidence for a literal connotation based on scientific fact. Synthetic growth hormones, which have been resident in our food supply over the last several decades from US cattle production, are demonstrating measurable feminizing effects on children. They cause girls to develop at a younger age (has anyone else noticed that at all), but also cause boys not to develop as much. Certainly average sperm counts are significantly -- and otherwise, inexplicably -- reduced from even 25 years ago. Regarding the well-being of our country, it appears we are facing a very dangerous sociologically and perhaps physiologically based pathology now developed well beyond its infancy. While "exceptions to the new rule" remain, there are not nearly enough -- few would likely make it to any Boston Tea Party today.

dcj</span>

 

[Farm Gal]

David:
There was also a comprehensive article on this matter in the NY Times... the media is just starting to get awakened to this issue... Europe has known for years and refuses (mostly) to buy our beef for this very reason... I can't recall the exact figure but the percentage of girls hitting puberty at age 8 and 9 is frightening!!! And the number hitting it younger than that increases every year!!!! 8O

A $1.35 (appx)shot makes a baby steer do in one year what it used to take grass 2 years to accomplish, ditto with the milk, and most of the poutry products in terms of accelerated growth.... now we are feeding both lil b human boys n girls these products AND the grains grown on the byproducts of these animals & fertilzer laced with these estrogens and such and oh MY is it any wonder the 4th graders are giving each other a serious eye? When they used to (Mostly) be shoving each other around on the playground at that age ?

 

[Ray Ohler]

What the plantiffs MAY be going after in the case Terrell describes is "CIVIL" RICO not criminal. Same "guidelines" pretty much apply but DOJ doesn't necessarily have to get involved. Although if a civil RICO determination is reached, the DOJ may very well carry it into a criminal case if they have the time, money and believe they can get a slam-dunk. Main points that have to be proven are the presence of either mail or wire fraud, probability of the activity being continued, etc. What it does is afford the attorneys the chance to triple the damages and THUSLY THEIR FEES. Big Ameriquest case (4.1M - I say big because of all the people involved) here a couple of years ago got a civil RICO judgment. Haven't really followed it to see if criminal prosecution was ever pursued. Probably haven't even collected the LOSSES let alone treble damages.

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

Actually chemicals have very little to do with growing birds or cattle - I've done both. One of the Tyson "Nuts" - nutritionists for birds - told me that you are eating a baby bird - hardly 6 weeks old. They do not respond well to chemicals. You grow them the same way you get a 180 pound 8 year old boy. Keep them still w/ no exercise (TV), cool (air conditioner), and feed them all the high protein and fat you can. Other than phosphorus and calcium to keep their bones from breaking, birds are fed little in chemical and sparingly in vitamins (which the grower, not the chicken co. pays for)

I have tried hormone implants in cattle with no sucess. Ours are all grass fat and over 1 year before the go to the feed lot for finishing.

The worse of the chemicals in my book are the nitrate preservatives found in those added water packages which the packers and grocery chains use.

 

[David C. Johnson]

<span style='color:darkblue'>Terrel,

You write:

"I have tried hormone implants in cattle with no success.
Ours are all grass fat and over 1 year before the go to
the feed lot for finishing."

According to that article, it sounds like you should be charging a good bit more for your cattle. My guess: Money well spent! (but I will probably, unfortunately, just keep buying what looks good or is on sale at the grocery store ).

"The worse of the chemicals in my book are the nitrate
preservatives found in those added water packages
which the packers and grocery chains use."

Yep, no doubt sorry stuff for us as well as for most replicating pathogenic bacteria -- they do perform at bit as "global anti-biotics," problems is, we is biotic too!
___________________

Lee Ann,

Regarding girls:

Eight & Nine and getting Younger? -- Sheeech!

Regarding boys:

It appears its getting harder and harder these days -- with the cattle-country of the Midwest being no exception -- to even comply with the most popular of cultural wisdom (let alone ever-changing appraisal rules). For example, take an old song I heard on the radio just the other day:

"Momma, don't let your cowboy's grow up to be babies..."

(or something like that, I think)

"...Teach them to be doctors and lawyers and such..."

(personally, I might only recommend just doctors and suches -- Doctors are useful, and there's always use for another Such, or two!)

dcj</span>