Trial Activity

Texas State Bank Trustee of the Guerra Mineral Trusts; Cow Creek Corporation; Will Carter; James W. Collins, Trustee of the Carvan, Vanco and Vannie Cook Trusts and Dorchester Minerals, L.P. v. El Paso Production Oil & Gas U.S.A., L.P. and EEX E & P Company, L.P. Cause No. DC-03-117, in the 381st Judicial District Court of Starr County, Texas.

Alison D. Kennamer of the firm served as additional counsel for Defendants in this case involving claims by mineral interest owners against their oil and gas lessees. Plaintiffs claimed that Defendants had defrauded them by failing to disclose the expiration of the continuous drilling period of the lease, had committed fraud in the misinterpretation of a Pugh clause, and had trespassed by drilling directional wells through non-unitized shallow depths which Plaintiffs contended were not held by unit production. Defendants alleged numerous legal and factual defenses. After a partial summary judgment interpreting a portion of the lease as argued by Plaintiffs was granted before trial, a jury was empaneled on February 24, 2005, and evidence began on February 28, 2005. On March 4, 2005, the jury rendered a verdict which found that all Plaintiffs had either released their claims or had ratified and revived the leases as to the shallow depths, which rendered Plaintiffs' other claims moot.