Ohio Landowners Get Free Help To Battle Pipeline Land-Grab

Eminent domain has become a favored tool for the project

Landowners who don't want an energy company seizing their property through eminent domain for a pipeline may get their day in court.

Lawyer Maurice Thompson, executive director of the 1851 Center for Constitutional Law, is offering free legal representation to landowners menaced by construction of the ATEX Express pipeline, which will run from Appalachia to Texas.

The pipeline is being built by Enterprise Liquids Pipeline LLC, which has been asserting eminent domain authority under a 60-year-old Ohio law that grants the state's land-expropriation authority to various energy and water companies.