May 3, 2019 4 min read

The owner of an oil and gas trucking company that until recently was based in Chartiers Township is being sued by former employees who say he canceled their health insurance without telling them but for months continued to deduct money that ostensibly was going toward the premiums.

The 16 plaintiffs named in a complaint filed Monday in Washington County Court of Common Pleas were working for Mustang Oilfield Services LLC as of Aug. 1, when the company ended the health, vision and dental coverage it had been offering.

The nonunion employees allegedly continued forfeiting money for their share of the insurance premiums. Their attorney, John Egers, said he doesn’t know where that money went instead.

“They were taking these deductions, and weren’t applying them to insurance,” said Egers, who’s with the Julian Law Firm in Washington. “We’re going to find out where this money went.”

Egers said in an interview the deductions from his clients’ weekly paychecks ranged from $47 to $145. They’re trying to recover that money and other losses they suffered as a result of the insurance cancellation.

For example, Egers said many of his clients who received medical bills wouldn’t have had to pay on their own if their coverage had been left in place. Those who couldn’t pay the unexpected bills found themselves on the hook for late fees, too.

The complaint also says eight of the former workers are still owed wages despite leaving the company at least two months ago.

Along with Mustang, company president Gregory Cook is named as a defendant. Cook, who lives in Belmont County, Ohio, is the company’s only registered owner.

Mustang occupied a warehouse on Alpha Drive but no longer does. It was registered in Ohio in 2013 and is still listed as active by the state.

The lawsuit contains claims of breach of contract, conversion, fraud, negligent misrepresentation and unjust enrichment, plus counts under the state Wage Payment Collection and Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection laws.

A count of promissory estoppel – an allegation that Mustang’s employees were acting on a promise from the company it would provide them with benefits – was included as an alternative to the beach-of-contract claim.

The lawsuit seeks compensatory and punitive damages, plus other costs and interest.

As part of the suit, Egers is asking the court to “pierce the corporate veil” to hold Cook liable for the actions of his company. Cook allegedly controlled its affairs, “ignored corporate formalities” and “treated the assets of Mustang as his own,” Egers wrote.

Ohio Department of State records show Mustang was incorporated in 2013. In a 2015 article, the Associated Press reported that Mustang’s trucks carted water to fracking well sites and hauled wastewater away. It also transported equipment for gas drillers.

Megan Cook, Gregory’s wife, is identified in the article as the company’s director of marketing. She’s not named in the lawsuit. Records in the state of Ohio show a new LLC, Bearcat Energy Logistics, was registered under her name on Feb. 11.

Some of the 16 plaintiffs live in Washington County and other parts of Southwestern Pennsylvania. Some also live in the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia and eastern Ohio, and one person has since moved to Florida.

Egers said his clients, who were mostly truck drivers, all left their jobs at Mustang by early this year. Some of them left their jobs voluntarily. Others stayed on but stopped being scheduled to work. A third group continued to work for Mustang “until there was no longer work there,” Egers said.

Court records don’t show an attorney as having entered an appearance for Mustang. James Southworth of the Pittsburgh firm Dickie, McCamey & Chilcote, who’s previously represented the company, didn’t return a message that afternoon.

A message left at a number listed for an office of Mustang’s purportedly located in Belmont County wasn’t returned, either.