'Trial of a lifetime' plays out in tiny South Dakota town

Reuters ^ | 09 June 2017 | Timothy Mclaughlin

[blueplum]

(ELK POINT, S.D.) In this rural outpost of just over 1,900 residents, a local college student has become a courtroom sketch artist, trailers on Main Street are ersatz offices for a major law firm and members of an agricultural youth club are puzzled by a new metal detector at the local courthouse.

The changes are part of Elk Point's selection as site of a multibillion-dollar defamation case pitting ABC News against South Dakota-meat processor, Beef Products Inc. The company contends that ABC and reporter Jim Avila defamed it by referring to its signature product as "pink slime" in 2012 broadcasts.

BPI calls its product lean finely textured beef (LFTB). The trial, scheduled to run eight weeks, opened on Monday. ABC is a unit of Walt Disney Co.

While BPI could face an uphill battle to show ABC intended to harm the company or knew its reporting was false, as required to prove a defamation claim, several Elk Point residents interviewed by Reuters this week were sympathetic to BPI and its founder, Eldon Roth.

[blueplum]

"BPI has claimed up to $1.9 billion of damages, which could be tripled to $5.7 billion. The local newspaper, the Southern Union County Leader-Courier, has dubbed it "the trial of a lifetime."

[Parley Baer]

I hope ABC looses. They generate a lot of fake news and this is probably one of them.

[piasa]

I’m pretty sure the communist-loving David Fenton of Fenton Communications was involved in this smear, too.

[Parley Baer]

Make that loses.

[Fiddlstix]

Ditto!

[Mears]

“The trial of a lifetime”

---

How old are the writers at this paper?

Ten ?

.

[Jonty30]

They mean that, for the town, it’s a trial of the century.

[reaganaut]

SD ping

[reaganaut]

MrR is a retired lawyer in SD and I am hoping this goes to the state Supreme Court - they will have a field day feeding ABC to the hogs.

[DoughtyOne]

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[mrreaganaut]

I’m glad we get ours butchered in Chamberlain. It should be an interesting trial.

[JennysCool]

Both the government and the media have been sliming American business for decades. I hope, this time, they get slimed back.

[blueplum]

probably not very old or really, really old

[T-Bird45]

These overheated writers need to get a sense of perspective on the subject. They could start by researching the Oprah trial vs. TX Beef in Amarillo. Besides infecting us w/Dr. Phil, it also showed that it’s tough to prove defamation.

[Saltmeat]

ABC is claiming no intent to defame the meat packer. Comey said Hillary did not intend to leak secret documents using her server hidden behind her contractor’s potty. I didn’t intend to run the stop sign either, but I’m doing time for involuntary manslaughter.

So why should it be so difficult to prove defamation? The end result in this situation is ABC maligned the man’s product so they should settle with him.

Not gonna happen though because the media moguls do not want to set the bar for future behavior to be judged by. They want every case to be to expensive for the average “joe” to even think about litigation. Well, the meat packer ain’t your average joe. He is trying to get the good reputation of his company back.

[MarMema]

Part of the leftist agenda to make us all vegetarians. Climate change ya know. Hope ABC gets completely fried.