Tyson wants Oklahoma ruling rescinded

A group of poultry producers, including the world’s largest, have asked a federal judge to dismiss his ruling that they polluted an Oklahoma watershed.

Arkansas-based Tyson Foods, Minnesota-based Cargill Inc. and the others say in a motion filed Thursday that evidence in the case is now more than 13 years old.

“This case is constitutionally moot because the court can no longer grant any effectual relief,” the companies argued in a filing with U.S. District Judge Gregory Frizzell in Tulsa.

The filing said Oklahoma conservation officials have noted a steady decline in pollution. It credited improved wastewater treatment plants, state laws requiring poultry-litter management plans and fewer poultry farms as a result of growing metropolitan areas in Northwest Arkansas.

A spokesperson for Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond did not immediately return a phone call for comment Saturday, but the attorney general’s office told the Tulsa World that “a resolution of this matter that is in the best interests of Oklahoma” is being sought.

Frizzell ruled in January that the companies were responsible for pollution of the Illinois River Watershed by disposing of chicken litter, or manure, that leached into the river.

Frizzell had ordered the poultry companies and the state to reach an agreement on how to remedy the effects of the pollution.

Attorneys for the companies and the state attorney general each said in Thursday filings that mediation had failed.

The other defendants named in the lawsuit are Cal-Maine Foods Inc., Tyson Poultry Inc., Tyson Chicken Inc., CobbVantress Inc., Cargill Turkey Production LLC, George’s Inc., George’s Farms Inc., Peterson Farms Inc. and Simmons Foods Inc.