Legal News

Recusal-Go-Round Continues at West Virginia Supreme Court

By Ashby Jones

Pittsburgh-based WSJ reporter Kris Maher kindly sent along the latest dispatch on the situation involving the West Virginia Supreme Court and Massey Energy Chief Executive Don Blankenship.

The recusal-go-round at the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals is still spinning in cases related to Massey Energy. And a lot of it is linked to the activity of one man: Massey CEO Don Blankenship.

Today Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corp. filed a motion to disqualify Justice Brent Benjamin from its appeal of a case pending before the court that involves Massey. The main reason: Blankenship spent $3.5 million of his own money to support the judicial election of Justice Benjamin in 2004.

Motions for recusal have been piling up in recent weeks, following allegations that Blankenship is too cozy with the West Virginia Supreme Court. Last month, photographs surfaced showing West Virginia Chief Justice Elliott “Spike” Maynard vacationing in Monaco with Blankenship in 2006, at which time a Massey appeal was pending before the court. In November, the court reversed a $76.3 million verdict against Massey in that case.

Maynard has since recused himself from that case involving Massey and a bankrupt coal company, and the court has agreed to rehear it. Benjamin has declined to recuse himself from that case. In the past few weeks, Maynard has also recused himself from two other Massey cases, one involving Wheeling-Pitt and another involving efforts to block Massey from building a coal silo near an elementary school. Click here, here and here for previous blog posts on the situation.

In today’s motion, Wheeling-Pitt’s lawyers call the $3.5 million “staggering and unprecedented” and say it is believed to be the most spent by an individual “to affect a state court judicial election in the history of the United States.”

A spokeswoman for the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals said that Benjamin doesn’t comment on cases pending before the court.

Law Blog-a-Pedia Legal Facts of the Day: As the picture indicates, the West Virginia Supreme Court is comprised of only five members. And it’s the state’s lone court of appellate review. West Virginia is only one of 11 states set up that way. Now you know, LB readers, now you know.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on February 13, 2008 (boomark / email).