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Cases We Handle

Britton Monts (formerly of Monts & Ware LLP) and the Monts Firm have been serving clients for 25 years providing high quality litigation services to individuals and small businesses throughout the U.S. in the areas of complex civil litigation, class action litigation, death and catastrophic injury claims and intellectual property litigation. We have achieved multimillion dollar results for our clients many times, some of them in high profile and nationally publicized cases.

Corporate False Claims

The U.S. and world economies have become a matter of concern for all of us. A culture of greed and corruption has been exposed causing the Federal Government (and its taxpayers) to shoulder mind-boggling bailouts and stimulus programs to prevent a catastrophic economic collapse. It is apparent that extensive fraud has been perpetrated on Federal and state governments through the submission of false corporate claims. With so many companies “downsizing” and laying off thousands of employees, citizens with knowledge of overcharging and similar abuses under government contracts need to step forward to report such fraud. The False Claims Act is a federal law dating back to the Civil War that rewards citizens who report corporate false claims by allowing them to be paid from 15% to 30% of the money recovered from the corporate wrongdoer. The Monts Firm presently is devoting its energy to representing brave citizens who courageously step forward and report corporate false claims, and corporate false tax claims under a federal law administered by the IRS similar to the False Claims Act. For more information visit our info website (corporatefalseclaims.info).

Complex Civil Litigation

The Monts Firm has broad experience handling and trying complex civil cases, allowing us to deliver results for our clients regardless of the subject matter involved. We pride ourselves in handling cases that are difficult, novel and important. We accept the challenges and complexities these cases present because we are committed to excellence in our practice. We have proven results to back it up. From oil and gas and real estate issues to employment benefits disputes, we are ready to help our clients achieve the best possible results.

Class Actions

In class action litigation, the claims of thousands (even millions) of individuals are consolidated into one case. The individual claims may be too small to pursue alone. Class actions allow people to band together and hold companies accountable for harming many people in ways that involve too small a sum of money to justify separate claims (like wrongfully charging thousands of consumers small fees – fees that add up to millions of dollars to the company). Britton Monts has served as class counsel in a number of large, national class action lawsuits. This experience allows us to efficiently evaluate potential class claims and pursue the good ones aggressively.

Death and Catastrophic Injury Claims

We have extensive experience representing people who have suffered life-threatening injuries and the families of people who have died as a result of others' negligence. These cases are one of the most important events in our clients’ lives, and we treat them with the seriousness and compassion they deserve. Our trial experience and innovative approaches have allowed us to obtain multimillion dollar settlements and recoveries for our clients many times.

Intellectual Property

A patentee has the right to exclude others from practicing his or her invention. Individuals and small business owners often find it difficult to enforce their patents against infringers. Patent infringement lawsuits are complex, time consuming and expensive. The Monts Firm evaluates and when warranted, accepts patent cases from inventors and patent owners seeking creative ways to protect their valuable rights.

Oil and Gas Litigation

Britton Monts has extensive experience handling oil and gas litigation, much of it involving mineral owners with claims for underpayment of royalty on oil and gas production and oil and gas lease disputes with companies that lease their mineral acreage. The oil and gas industry can be a rough and tumble business. Mineral owners and investors often are unaware of the creative and aggressive practices by some oil and gas companies to reduce royalty payments to landowners. As an example, one practice used frequently by these companies is known as an “affiliate sale” of oil and gas production. Since royalty is calculated as a percentage of the price paid by the first buyer of production, the oil company will set up its own “marketing company” to buy the oil and gas at a lower price (the price on which royalty is then calculated) and then immediately resell the production to an actual third party purchaser at a higher price. Sometimes this same trick is carried out by having the affiliate marketing company charge “marketing fees” to find a buyer for the production. The marketing fee usually is a percentage of the sales price, which is deducted before calculating royalty payments to mineral owners. Because of our experience in these matters we can help landowners ensure they are being paid full royalties due under leases they have signed.

We also have experience handling oil and gas class action lawsuits. These cases are used to bundle numerous claims of a similar nature by mineral owners or working interest owners, particularly where the individual claims are too small to justify a separate lawsuit. This is an effective way to force an oil company to compensate mineral owners and working interest owners for underpayments.

Oil companies lease large tracts of acreage from the U.S. Government for exploration and drilling. When wells are drilled successfully the government (and in some instances, state governments) are paid royalties much like private mineral owners who lease their land to oil companies. Unfortunately companies sometimes fail to pay or underpay these royalties to the government. If a whistleblower (usually an insider who has actual knowledge of the scheme used to underpay or underreport royalty due) comes forward and reports such activity and the government recovers money as a result, the whistleblower receives a reward of between 15% and 30% of the money recovered under the False Claims Act . These lawsuits are known as oil and gas false claims lawsuits or oil and gas qui tam lawsuits. They are technical and in order to be successful a potential whistleblower needs the help of a committed and skilled law firm, like the Monts Firm.