HOUSTON, Aug. 18, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Houston attorney John Kim of The Kim
Law Firm is representing two plaintiffs against Marathon Oil Company based on
the company’s alleged failure
to pay royalties from a highly lucrative oil and
gas field in West Africa.
Mr. Kim represents Janis Frank Henry and Barbara Frank Sharman, the daughters
of noted geologist/geophysicist G.W. Frank, who assisted in the development of
the Alba oil and gas field located in and near Equatorial Guinea. Ms. Henry
and Ms. Sharman claim that Marathon has disregarded a binding agreement
originally established by their father and Joe C. Walter, Jr., the oil and gas
entrepreneur who originally developed the Alba field. In 1991, Mr. Walter
entered into an agreement with Mr. Frank and other consultants to protect
their interests in the project “in the event that Walter’s interests in the
Alba Prospect would ever be bought out by larger oil and gas corporations.”
In 1995, Mr. Walter’s interests in Equatorial Guinea were sold to CMS Energy,
which later sold them to Houston-based Marathon in 2002. Mr. Frank died in
2000.
According to the daughters’ claim, which was filed on Aug. 12 in Harris County
District Court, the Alba field “has proven to be fabulously successful for
Marathon.”
“By shortchanging Frank, Marathon and the other Defendants have gained, and
will gain in the future, many millions of dollars in additional ill-begotten
profits,” the lawsuit says.
Ms. Henry and Ms. Sharman are intervenors in Carr P. Dishroon v. Marathon Oil
Company, No. 2008-40057, which includes similar claims against Marathon on
behalf of another consultant to Mr. Walter. That lawsuit includes claims that
Marathon underpays, or doesn’t pay at all, on condensate collected at onshore
plants; fails to pay royalties on the processed gas sold to third parties;
doesn’t pay a fair market gas price; and takes improper tax deductions.
“Companies like Marathon would be nothing without the hard work and expertise
provided by men like G.W. Frank,” says Mr. Kim. “For them to try to back out
of their legal agreements, as they are now, is shameful and needs to be
corrected.”
The Kim Law Firm has recovered more than half a billion dollars for clients
through aggressive litigation. Founder and veteran trial attorney John Kim has
earned the respect of his
clients and peers in Texas, throughout the U.S. and
internationally. For more information, please visit TheKimLawFirm.com.
Click here to read the article as originally published on Bloomberg.com.
