The Fake Cow Story

 There is a lot to this story which has not been totally laid out, and maybe it never gets completely told.

So there's this guy....Cody Allen Easterday (almost 50 years old).  He's from central Washington (around Mesa, about 50 miles east of Yakima).

Easterday had this deal with Tyson Foods...involving beef.  

Not much is said over his ranch operation.  Mesa is a fairly rural town....maybe 500 in the town itself.  

Easterday had a deal fixed up where Tyson and another company was paying him money to 'feed' cattle.  He would purchase cattle....then feed them (with special money from Tyson), then send them to the butcher at the right time.  

So in this situation....while you might think it was a measly $100,000 or $300,000....all total....Tyson and this partner had paid this guy $244-million.  There were apparently hundreds of thousands of cows in the middle of this deal.  

The deal said that once the cow was slaughtered and sold (market price)....retaining the money as profit was in Easterday's hand.

So back in 2016....a whole bunch of fake, false and fraudulent invoices occurred.  Tyson at the time....didn't figure this out. 

In the middle of this effort....some cows simply didn't exist.  Yeah....fake cows.  As weeks and months went by....more fake cows were created.  No one from Tyson ever came out to view tens of thousands of cows.  

During this period....cattle futures were beginning to be affected....the stock market was affected to some degree by fake cows.  Yes, even the futures market was affected....by non-existent cows.

I sat and looked over the story.  There's at least a hundred questions I would ask.

Was Easterday even a rancher? Where did Easterday get the idea to invent fake cows?  Why didn't Tyson ever send a guy out to view the 10,000-odd cows?  

I think this would make a fine 5-star movie....fake ranch, fake cows, fake round-ups, fake cowboys, fake business routine, incompetent company officials, etc.

What'll happen to Easterday?  Well....the question of the money will come up.  Where is the 200-plus million today?  Is it still in the US?  Jail-time?  He might get a decade in prison....but he'll be eventually released.  

The futures market?  How do you go back and rectify this?