After securing a complete victory for a major oil and gas client in an international arbitration, Ware Jackson partners Eileen O’Neill and Michelle Blair successfully defended the arbitration award in federal district court and again on appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The arbitrator—a former Texas Supreme Court Justice—had dismissed claims against Ware Jackson’s client for over $2 billion in alleged damages by a failed Saudi Arabian joint venture and awarded the client over $8.5 million for its counterclaim for unpaid and past-due equipment invoices. In a pithy opinion, the Fifth Circuit, like the federal district court, found no merit to the joint venture’s arguments for vacating the arbitration award or sending the dispute back to arbitration. 

In a long-fought battle on behalf of a major oil and gas company, Ware Jackson secured an international arbitration award early in 2021 that completely vindicated the client. The arbitrator dismissed claims against the client for over $2 billion in alleged damages by a failed Saudi Arabian joint venture and awarded the client over $8.5 million for its counterclaim for unpaid and past-due equipment invoices. At the end of the year, Ware Jackson successfully defended the arbitration award in a federal court in the United States, which rejected the Saudi company’s attempt to vacate the award. Attorneys Eileen O’Neill and Michelle Blair.

Partners Dennis Barrow, Tyler Henkel, and Michelle Blair secured a total defensive victory in an international arbitration. In the arbitration, former officers and shareholders alleged Ware Jackson’s clients, who are oil field service companies, breached multiple fiduciary duties. The claimants sought to establish that a series of corporate acquisitions, the implementation of a corporate debt structure, a corporate merger, a capital infusion and a stock redemption individually or together constituted an improper scheme to dilute and squeeze the claimants out of a company in which they had previously sold the majority interest to a corporate conglomerate. The claimants sought approximately $9 million in damages, along with their attorneys’ fees. After an evidentiary hearing, the arbitrator rendered an award that the claimants take nothing on their claims.