Washington, DC - Mystery on Why Feds are Investigating Kosher Meat Slaughterhouses

Washington, DC - No one in the kosher food industry is exactly sure why the Justice Department is investigating several major kosher slaughterhouses. Nor is it known for certainty just who is the target of the investigation.
Although a number of purveyors were said to have received subpoenas for the violation
of anti-trust laws, people familiar with the kosher food industry say that collusion on price fixing is the last thing that the companies practice. In fact, the sources say, there is cut throat competition for every dollar.

While AgriProcessor was identified as one of the targets of the federal investigation, there was speculation that Empire Kosher Poultry and Alle Processing had also either received notices of the investigation or were in fact subpoenaed.
The investigation may well have been underway for the past 9 or 10 months. But no one was able to obtain any definitive information from the federal government, deepening the mystery of what exactly is being investigated.
If the identities of the three companies is correct, the target may in fact be related to kosher poultry, rather than to kosher meat in general, which again perplexes kosher officials who say that a price war would be a more fitting description of the state of the industry than price fixing.
Some even charged PETA with taking their vendetta against Agri to the next level.

Noted attorney Nathan Lewin said that Agri was told that neither the corporation, nor any corporate officer or employee is presently a target of the investigation.