Agriprocessors could find a buyer soon, a bankruptcy trustee said Friday. “A sale is in the works and we should have an announcement” this week, said Joe Sarachek, who is overseeing the sale of Agriprocessors Inc. Sarachek declined to identify the buyer or say whether it was the same unidentified company that bought a $10 million loan from St. Louis-based First Bank to Agriprocessors this month, which paved the way for a sale. The bank had funneled the money to the plant so it could keep operating after it filed for bankruptcy protection in October.Sarachek said the company would be sold off as “a going concern” and won’t be broken up among multiple buyers. He had said the plant was more valuable whole than it would be split into parts, given its specific construction and the equipment designed to process kosher meat.
In an unprecedented move at the time, immigration agents raided the Agriprocessors slaughterhouse in Postville in May 2008 and arrested 389 people.
The company had been seeking a buyer since filing for bankruptcy. No buyer emerged during a bankruptcy auction in March, but Sarachek had said three companies were actively pursuing the plant.
A separate Agriprocessors operation, the now-closed Local Pride LLC plant in Gordon, Neb., will be sold separately from the Postville slaughterhouse, Sarachek said.
{AP, Dovid Bernstein-Matzav.com Newscenter}
