Thursday, December 30, 2010
Gas Supplier Ordered To Pay Royalties
KENTUCKY...
A jury in western Kentucky has ordered a Texas-based natural gas supplier to pay $31.35 million to a group of landowners and investors who claimed they were owed royalty payments.
The ruling against Atmos Energy came at the end of a five-week trial in Edmonson Circuit Court.
The suit was filed last year. The plaintiffs alleged the utility breached a contract that should have paid one-eighth of total royalties of its Park City gas project.
A.V. Conway, a Hartford attorney who represented the landowners, said Atmos had paid only about 1 percent of total royalties on the project.
The jury awarded about $7.7 million to the landowners, and the rest to a company owned by Robert Thorpe, which acted as a third-party producer in the project.
An attorney for Dallas-based Atmos did not respond to a request for comment.
A jury in western Kentucky has ordered a Texas-based natural gas supplier to pay $31.35 million to a group of landowners and investors who claimed they were owed royalty payments.The ruling against Atmos Energy came at the end of a five-week trial in Edmonson Circuit Court.
The suit was filed last year. The plaintiffs alleged the utility breached a contract that should have paid one-eighth of total royalties of its Park City gas project.
A.V. Conway, a Hartford attorney who represented the landowners, said Atmos had paid only about 1 percent of total royalties on the project.
The jury awarded about $7.7 million to the landowners, and the rest to a company owned by Robert Thorpe, which acted as a third-party producer in the project.
An attorney for Dallas-based Atmos did not respond to a request for comment.
# posted by Homer Owens @ 11:17 PM 
