During
the last oil boom in the early 1980's, we were retained by W. T. "Bud"
Massey to represent over a thousand of his landowner lessors in what
came to be know as the Despacing Cases. In Mitchell DeClerck's 100
years we've seen a number of these "booms".
Massey had obtained
oil and gas leases (the "Top Leases") on hundreds of thousands of
acres of farm land from Northwest Oklahoma farmers that would only be
good if existing leases expired (the "Bottom Leases"). He then
successfully sought and obtained court orders to cancel the Bottom
Leases which big oil company had been sitting on for decades to the
detriment of the farmers.
Since oil was then well over $100 a
barrel in today's dollars, a gold rush ensued with others seeking to
drill wells to extract the expensive oil to the benefit of our clients
and the farmers. Typically the Big Oil companies tried a myriad of
ploys and subterfuges to stop Massey and eventually the United States
Supreme Court approved what Massey had done.
The litigation was
a complex and interesting one in which we were called upon to manage
and organize thousands of pleadings affecting more than a thousand
clients in over a hundred cases -- all before personal computers were
widely used.
We were honored to help Bud Massey and his many friends stand up to Big Oil. So if you have a similar problem, we've been there and done that.