An Ohio state trial court ruling has affirmed Yetter Coleman LLP’s precedent-setting $70 million verdict win for Triad Hunter LLC against Westlake Chemical Corp. The victory, secured by a team led by partners Tracy N. LeRoy and Connie H. Pfeiffer, ends the long-running litigation, which spanned a trial and several appeals.
Triad Hunter, a subsidiary of Expand Energy Corp. (formerly known as Southwestern Energy), sued after Westlake’s solution mining operations in West Virginia created a huge subsurface brine cavern. The cavern crossed under the Ohio River and trespassed onto Triad’s property, severely disrupting its oil and gas operations.
Before the 2022 trial, the Yetter Coleman team engaged an expert to conduct pressure testing, which provided key evidence that Westlake’s cavern was directly impacting Triad’s well. That, plus hundreds of missing gallons of water that Westlake couldn’t account for, overwhelmingly proved the trespass. The jury unanimously found Westlake liable for negligence and trespass, awarding $70 million in past damages and lost profits to Triad.
The case did not end there, and the Yetter Coleman team tenaciously defended Triad’s win at every turn. Westlake hired new counsel and filed exhaustive post-trial motions, which were all denied. It then appealed every possible issue — intent, standard of care, causation, damages, experts and more — and lost again in an Ohio court of appeals. Undeterred, Westlake tried to appeal to the Ohio Supreme Court, which declined the case. Finally, Westlake returned to the state trial court with a post-appeal motion to vacate the judgment based on “new” testing data that it said showed the brine caverns were “nowhere near” Triad’s property.
On July 23, 2025, the Monroe County court entered orders denying Westlake’s final efforts to avoid responsibility. The court’s decision confirmed the original $70 million verdict with an added $6 million in interest, for a total of $76 million. Westlake paid the full amount the week of July 25.
ALM’s Texas Lawyer covered Yetter Coleman’s final win in this long-running case, noting that it “represents a significant precedent for subsurface trespass law, particularly as underground operations become more common.”
“Ohio is a place where there is a lot of natural gas development right now, and their law on this particular issue is actually ahead of Texas, and I think it is kind of in the lead nationally with recognizing subsurface trespass,” Pfeiffer said in the Texas Lawyer article.
LeRoy told Texas Lawyer that the case also demonstrated the sophistication of juries when it comes to understanding complex technical information.
“The big takeaway from this case is that juries can handle complicated technical and scientific testimony if it’s explained in a simple and easy-to-follow manner,” LeRoy said. “At the end of the day, the case was about the concept of trespass, which is something that almost everybody can understand. You’re supposed to stay off your neighbor’s property.”
In addition to LeRoy and Pfeiffer, the Yetter Coleman team included senior counsel Christian J. Ward and Audrey Hendricks, and associate Luke A. Schamel.
Read the Texas Lawyer article here (PDF).