Engler First To Take Stand
In Fourth Week Of Oprah Trial

By David Bowser

AMARILLO — Lead plaintiff Paul Engler was the first witness to take the stand in the fourth week of the case he and other cattlemen are pursuing against talk show host Oprah Winfrey.

Engler testified Monday that he was "shocked" at false statements on her show about the safety of the nation’s beef supply.

"There was an inference throughout the show that beef was unsafe," Engler said. "This is a product that I've taken pride in producing for over 50 years."

He also termed a "lie" claims by vegetarian activist Howard Lyman that the beef industry considers any animal that doesn’t stagger safe to eat.

"If Mr. Lyman had said it was his opinion, not fact, I could accept that," Engler said.

The suit stems from an April 1996 show in which Winfrey and Lyman alleged that U.S. beef may be infected with so-called "mad cow" disease.

"Mad cow," Humane Society spokesman Lyman had charged at Winfrey’s urging, "will make AIDS look like the common cold," to which Winfrey replied, "You’ve just stopped me cold from eating another burger!"

The plaintiffs are suing Lyman, Winfrey and her production company for $10.3 million they contend they lost when cattle prices plunged following the airing of the episode.

Central to their case is the show’s editing, which they have demonstrated in court eliminated most rebuttals of Lyman’s comments. In addition, witnesses have testified that Winfrey used breaks in the taping to whip the studio audience into an anti-beef frenzy which one likened to a "lynch mob."

Testimony by Winfrey’s own personnel also conceded that much of the audience for that episode was hand-picked to represent an anti-beef viewpoint, unlike the show’s usual practice of drawing audiences from the general public.

Winfrey herself testified last week, dividing her time between wooing the jury, downplaying her own impact, and blaming subordinates for anything that might have been wrong with the program under scrutiny.

Winfrey said she had little to do with putting together the episode on mad cow disease, adding that she relied on her "team of producers."

A former employee testified on videotape, however, that producer James Kelley had told him Winfrey specifically ordered him to edit out statements in defense of beef safety by National Cattlemen’s Beef Association spokesman Dr. Gary Weber.

For his part, Kelley testified that he expects to be fired once the trial is over. He said he believes Winfrey is keeping him on the payroll to be sure he doesn’t turn against her in court.

Winfrey also showed undisguised disdain for those hurt by the episode. Asked if she was aware her show could influence cattle prices, she replied that she "wasn't thinking about the beef industry" when she raised doubts about meat safety.

"I don't go into a show thinking about corporations and people's money," she retorted.

Co-defendant Howard Lyman is identified as the executive director of the "eating with conscience" campaign for the Humane Society of the United States. Neverthless, he told the jury — apparently with a straight face — that he went on the Winfrey show with no agenda to promote.

Under questioning by an attorney for the plaintiffs, Lyman said he went on the show "to express my opinion on the mad cow disease and the circumstances surrounding it."

In a Clintonesque version of "dancing with words," the vegetarian activist said, "I raise the issue with individuals about their diet and what they're eating, but I do not tell people not to eat beef."

He similarly defended his use of baseless claims to promote the anti-meat agenda, claiming he was simply "educating" people, and adding that "I believe there are a lot of ways of educating other than facts."

He evinced the same disdain as Winfrey for victims of his attacks, and if anything, he was more forthright about it.

Asked if he realized that convincing people not to eat meat could hurt the beef industry financially, Lyman responded coldly: "That potential exists."

Lyman promotes himself as an attorney, but he was forced to admit under oath that his advertised "law degree" is an "honorary" award from the City University of Los Angeles.

When asked if he attended any classes, Lyman said no.

"I attended a ceremony at a hotel in Los Angeles," he

admitted.

An expert witness testified this week that remarks by Lyman and Winfrey were a shock to the market that caused cattle prices to drop.

Dr. Wayne D. Purcell of Virginia Tech testified that from his study of the cattle market during that period, he concluded that a dramatic shock — from something out of the ordinary — caused the fed cattle market to drop in April 1996.

"A shock drove fed cattle prices far below where they would have been," Purcell said. "That shock was caused by the Oprah Winfrey Show."

Purcell said the shock was outside the normal influence of supply and demand considerations.

Pointing to an oversized chart displayed in front of the jury, Purcell noted three drops in fed cattle prices between January 1994, and August 1996. The first, he said, was the week of May 28, 1994, and was caused by an excessive number of cattle on feed reported by the USDA. The next two drops, the weeks ending April 20 and April 27, 1996, were caused by Winfrey's show.

Purcell's testimony followed that of lead plaintiff Paul Engler, president of Cactus Feeders.

Engler outlined his trading program on the Chicago Mercantile, drawing sharp distinctions between hedging and speculating on cattle futures. He bristled at an accusation by defense attorneys that his trading was a gamble and he wanted television personality Oprah Winfrey to pay for a bad bet he made in the market.

Engler stood firm as Lyman's attorney, Barry Peterson, tried to lead him down the path that Lyman said British and U.S. cattle industries were following concerning mad cow disease. While Peterson tried to connect similarities between the two countries and their cattle industries, Engler denied that the U.S. was following England's lead prior to the mad cow outbreak in Great Britain, pointing to differences in the rendering systems and BSE surveillance programs.

When Winfrey's attorney, Chip Babcock, tried to get Engler to admit during his testimony that other demons were affecting the cattle market in the spring of 1996, including drouth and high feed grain prices, Engler stood firm in his insistence that the market drop was caused by false statements made on Winfrey's show.

Engler said he was in Chicago the day the show aired. He said he felt that false statements on the show were a personal attack on him and on the business to which he had devoted more than 50 years of his life.

The Texas cattleman explained how his company Amarillo-based Cactus Feeders hedged part of the cattle in their feedyards on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and how on April 16, 1996, after the Winfrey show aired, the futures markets dropped, setting off a drop in price and sales of live cattle in his feedyards.

Babcock repeatedly asked Engler about the effect high corn prices and drouth had on cattle prices. Engler insisted the demons to which Babcock referred would have affected feeder cattle and ranchers producing them, not live cattle and the slaughter prices which dropped after her show.

Engler said that although the futures market was highly volatile at the time, comments made on Winfrey's show precipitated the price drop for finished cattle coming out of the feedyard.

"That was the bomb that set the whole thing off," Engler said.