United States v. Donald L. Blankenship
The Fourth Circuit held that a district court committed no reversible error in a case where an energy company chairman was convicted of conspiring to violate federal mine safety laws. The case involved an accident on April 5, 2010, at the Upper Big Branch coal mine in Montcoal, West Virginia, which ...
Great Basin Resource Watch v. Bureau of Land Management
The Ninth Circuit held that BLM violated NEPA when it approved a proposed molybdenum mining operation near Eureka, Nevada. Environmental groups filed suit against BLM, challenging the agency's analysis of the project's cumulative air impacts and the baseline levels of certain air pollutants, and the...
Rocky Mountain Helium, LLC v. United States
The Federal Circuit affirmed in part and remanded in part a lower court decision dismissing a helium extraction company's breach of contract claims against the United States. In 1994, the parties entered a contract under which BLM gave the company the right to extract helium gas from roughly 21,000 ...