Energy Transfer Unit Sues Pipeline Safety Agency for Jury Trial

A unit of Energy Transfer LP sued the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration alleging that the agency’s in-house tribunals violate the Seventh Amendment’s jury trial guarantee.

“PHMSA’s attempt to adjudicate liability and impose significant civil penalties” without a jury is unconstitutional after the US Supreme Court’s decision in SEC v. Jarkesy, Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co. said in the complaint, filed Monday in the US District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

After an accident at a station on the Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line killed an employee in 2020, PHMSA notified it of probable violations to pipeline ...