Oprah Seeks To Move
Second Beef Lawsuit

AMARILLO — Oprah Winfrey prefers Amarillo to Dumas. She also prefers a friendly federal court to a state court of unknown disposition.

Attorneys for daytime television queen Oprah Winfrey and vegetable activist Howard Lyman Monday filed a motion to move a second beef disparagement suit from state district court in Dumas to federal court in Amarillo. Winfrey and Lyman are being sued by owners of cattle in Panhandle feedyards for what the cattlemen claim were disparaging remarks about U.S. beef made on Winfrey's nationally-syndicated television show in April 1996.

Winfrey and Lyman won a lawsuit earlier this year in federal court in Amarillo brought by the owners of the feedyards. The jury's verdict in that case is being appealed by the cattlemen. On April 16, the two-year anniversary of the airing of the Winfrey show in question, 137 customers of Cactus Feeders filed suit in state district court in Dumas using the same allegations as in the earlier federal suit.

Kevin Isern, attorney for the cattle feeders, says that because none of the plaintiffs claim individual damages of more than $75,000 and because one of the plaintiffs lives in Illinois where Winfrey and her production company are based, the suit should remain in state court.

The earlier lawsuit was moved to federal court because of the amount of damages claimed, about $12 million, and because the plaintiffs and the defendents lived in different states.

Barry Peterson, Lyman's attorney, filed notice to move the suit from state to federal court with the U.S. District Court Friday. The same notice was filed in state court Monday.

In his filing, Peterson says the plaintiffs are business entities organized in Texas and that Lyman is a citizen of Virginia.

Peterson also claims in the filing that the amount being claimed in damages exceeds $75,000.

In his filing in federal court, Peterson says the new lawsuit seeks to circumvent and attack orders and the final judgement of Feb. 27, by U.S. District Judge Mary Lou Robinson in the earlier suit. Peterson says in the court papers that the new suit is nothing more than a bold and improper attempt to re-try in state court matters which were determined in federal court.