October 14, 2015
Ex-Massey Energy Chief Executive Officer Donald Blankenship downplayed the threat that miners develop black-lung disease in shafts choked with coal dust, jurors in the executive’s criminal trial heard in a recorded phone call. Blankenship, a vocal opponent of government regulations, …
October 12, 2015
Donald Blankenship’s own words may come to haunt the former Massey Energy Co. chief executive officer at his criminal trial as a federal judge said prosecutors can let the jury hear conversations secretly recorded while he led the company. U.S. …
October 6, 2015
Before death came to Upper Big Branch Mine, Donald L. Blankenship managed his patch of Appalachia like King Coal incarnate. Outside homes in rural West Virginia flew the banner of his company, Massey Energy Co.: a flame leaping out of …
June 2, 2015
Alpha Natural Resources Inc. no longer qualifies for a government program that subsidizes a share of mine cleanup insurance, requiring the coal company to find another way to cover roughly $400 million in liabilities, Wyoming officials said last Friday. State …
May 29, 2015
Alpha Natural Resources must pay the legal expenses of Donald Blankenship, the former chief executive officer of Massey Energy, which Alpha acquired in 2011. The fight over fees arose from charges filed against Blankenship stemming from the worst U.S. coal …
April 9, 2015
Former Massey Energy Co. Chief Executive Officer Donald Blankenship, facing criminal trial over an April 2010 explosion that killed 29 miners, said the year before that he feared a disaster with 100 deaths. “I don’t want to go to 100 …
March 25, 2015
The former chief executive of Massey Energy Co. pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to a revised federal indictment arising from a 2010 West Virginia coal mine explosion that killed 29 miners. The former chief executive, Donald Blankenship, entered his plea …
January 6, 2015
Ex-Massey Energy chief Donald Blankenship won an almost three-month delay of his trial, scheduled to begin later this month, on federal charges tied to a fatal 2010 mine explosion that was the worst U.S. coal industry disaster in 40 years. …