Tyson: Easterday Contract Didn't Exist

LINCOLN, Neb. (DTN) -- Easterday Ranches in eastern Washington was paid for beef sold in Japan and rancher Cody Easterday had no valid contract with Tyson Fresh Meats to also be paid individually for the use of his image and likeness on Japanese meat labels, attorneys for Tyson said in a brief filed in a federal appellate court this week.

In January, Easterday appealed a previously dismissed lawsuit to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco. Easterday is serving an 11-year prison sentence in California after he pleaded guilty to operating a $233 million ghost-cattle scheme in which he charged Tyson for raising cattle that didn't exist. Easterday has paid the company tens of millions of dollars in restitution.

A district court in Washington dismissed his claims in October 2023.

According to Tyson's brief filed in the Ninth Circuit, Easterday was unable to prove the existence of a contract with Tyson to pay him for the use of his likeness. Easterday claims the company owes him about $100 million.

Tyson said Easterday makes claims of an individual contract with the company based on a single email exchange with a Tyson official.

"In a nutshell, Mr. Easterday asserts that a largely inscrutable email exchange in May 2020 -- of which he repeatedly only quotes a snippet -- was actually an acknowledgement of an oral agreement six or seven years earlier (it's a mystery exactly when) by which he would personally receive half of the profits from the cattle deals between the corporate entities because his name and likeness were on labels in Japan," Tyson said in its brief.

"There are numerous problems with that proposition, including: insufficient allegations of a meeting of the minds, lack of essential terms, sheer implausibility given written agreements between the corporate entities, and significant untimeliness and unclean hands."

When it comes to Easterday Ranches the business entity, Tyson said there was a written contract, and Tyson exported some of the ranch's beef to Japan marketed under the name "Cody's Beef."

"Mr. Easterday began suggesting that perhaps Tyson owed something extra for the 'Cody's Beef' marketing in Japan," Tyson said in the brief.

"Of course, if Tyson owed something to Easterday Ranches, that claim would have been resolved in the bankruptcy. Conveniently, Mr. Easterday asserts in this lawsuit -- filed after the criminal restitution order and after the close of the bankruptcy -- that Tyson owed him money personally on an oral contract, separate and apart from all of the written contracts between the corporate entities and the claims that were wound up in the bankruptcy."

Tyson began taking steps in 2013 to increase its presence in the Japanese marketplace. The brief said Tyson approached Easterday to see whether Easterday Ranches would be interested in serving as Tyson's exclusive supplier of beef to Japan.

Easterday pleaded guilty to wire fraud in connection with the ghost-cattle scheme he conducted in an attempt to make up for losses he sustained in the futures market.

On Aug. 28, 2023, the district court dismissed another lawsuit filed by Easterday against Tyson alleging the company had committed several antitrust violations and violated the Packers and Stockyards Act during a 10-year business relationship.

The Easterday Ranches saga drew national attention when a company connected to the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints was the winning bidder for the Easterday assets. The second-highest bidder was an investment company tied to Microsoft founder Bill Gates.

According to court documents in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Eastern Washington, Farmland Reserve, owned by the church, was awarded the winning bid of $209 million for the Easterday assets.

Easterday operated an extensive family farm operation in eastern Washington involved in cattle feeding as well as 22,500 acres of potatoes, onions, corn and wheat in the Columbia Basin.

Beginning in 2016 and continuing through November 2020, Easterday submitted false and fraudulent invoices and other information to Tyson and another company.

The Easterday Ranches Inc. owner received reimbursement from the companies for the purported purchase and raising of cattle the company never actually bought.

Read more on DTN:

"Easterday Appeals Tyson Ruling," https://www.dtnpf.com/…

Todd Neeley can be reached at todd.neeley@dtn.com

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