Cyrus Dugger

The Tortellini: Real Legalized Extortion

The Tortellini discusses another example of big companies that attempt to avoid legitimate payouts, but that are eventually forced to pay… that then just leave the state and attempt to extort future legal immunity.

Here’s real legalized extortion..

So the nation’s third-largest natural gas company defrauds more than 8,000 West Virginia landowners, including a 90-year-old retired school teacher, out of more than $100 million in royalty payments on gas extracted from the land it leases from them. The landowners sue the company, and in January, win a $134 million verdict. The outraged jury, which learned that the company used Enron-like shell corporations to hide the deception and spent the money on huge golden parachute payments to top executives, then tacks on another $271 million in punitive damages (a completely defensible and constitutional 1:2 ratio of punitive to actual damages, I might add). (keep reading on The Tortellini)

Posted at 4:41 PM, Feb 27, 2007 in Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)