UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS EASTERN DIVISION IN RE BROILER CHICKEN ANTITRUST LITIGATION No. 16 C 8637 Judge Thomas M. Durkin
A federal judge in Illinois removed seven defendants and two theories of liability from the consolidated antitrust case brought by purchasers of chicken meat against broiler chicken producers. The judge still found that the plaintiffs’ economic evidence was sufficient for the case to proceed to a jury trial and that the plaintiffs could proceed on their claims of anticompetitive acts to increase price through supply reductions. According to the published opinion, the case presents “numerous examples of supposed competitors regularly exchanging sensitive production data with each other. A jury could find that such conduct is not the behavior of active competitors.”
[To accompany Federal Court Case Law Update "Federal Chicken Price-Fixing Suit Narrowed but Allowed to Proceed” from Brooks Animal Law Digest Issue No. 197]