Judge tosses chicken growers’ $500 million complaint against Pilgrim’s Pride

A federal judge in Texas dismissed with prejudice a lawsuit filed by chicken growers claiming Pilgrim’s Pride violated federal law by wielding market power to manipulate pricing when it closed several plants amid the economic recession in 2009.

The plaintiffs were more than 200 poultry growers, most selling their chickens to two Pilgrim’s plants — El Dorado, Ark., and Farmerville, La. — that the company closed in early 2009 as part of Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings. The company filed for bankruptcy, it said, because its own overproduction was causing major financial losses. The company had an estimated 50 percent share of the market at the time.