Exactly Jam.
Plus, people keep in mind that Mitchell and Furr is not an operating company in the sense that PBLS is. They are an LLC put together by family members who own the pit. That's it. That's all they do. They're not some south Louisiana power family. Their dad/uncle died and left them a big hole in the ground. They have no other revenue sources to draw upon to pay legal fees etc. Their business is solely in the royalties paid per ton of product mined from the pit. And Furr particularly just happens to be one stubborn good old boy who doesn't want to give up his case. But IMO (and that's all it is opinion) they have to be running out of money now with attornies working for a percentage of potential future returns.
The REAL gripe of their argument is that PBLS could mine the pit that their PR's claim is worth hundreds of millions and then file for bankruptcy and not pay Mitchell and Furr. We all believe that PBLS isn't going to do that, that hopefully PBLS does have multiple revenue streams to pay court costs, and therefore can take this to the highest level if possible. But that's not what they want. Make no mistake, if PBLS could, they would buy the pit. They probably would drop their counter-suit for business interference (and they have a very strong case against Furr) and even agree to raising the royalties a bit, if Furr would drop their case. If Mitchell doesn't drop the case, well they will simply keep mining the pit and then move their equipment over to the new pit in MS. Right now this is just a contest of who is more stubborn, and hopefully/probably PBLS has the deeper pockets to out last them. Because in the end, Furr has no real case. They are grasping at straws, which is why after almost 4 years of lawyering, the case still goes on at the local level. And for what Mitchell's attorney pulled with the eviction notice, well he's fortunate that stunt didn't get him disbarred IMO.
Again, tell all the lawyers reading this that it's just my own stupid opinion (MOSO for short) based on reading all the documents because I often suffer from work avoidance and so hide on these message boards & read weird court docs as DD in the middle of the night etc etc.
Ren
"Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn." C.S. Lewis
www.younglife.org
