Monday, October 10th 2016
ABC and former news anchor Diane Sawyer are asking a South Dakota court to dismiss a one-point-two billion dollar defamation lawsuit filed by Beef Products Inc. (BPI). BPI is suing ABC over the network’s 2012 coverage of its lean, finely textured beef product, which ABC repeatedly referred to as “pink slime”. BPI says ABC’s report misled consumers to believe the product was unsafe, damaging BPI’s reputation and causing a “significant negative financial impact” on the company. In court documents filed last week, Sawyer said their reporting was done in the public’s interest as consumers were unaware that the product, at the time, was present in 70 percent of the ground beef sold in supermarkets. The case is currently slated to go to trial in June.