'Frack Master' Chris Faulkner

Dallas ‘Frack Master’ arrested by Los Angeles Airport police

From an Article by Jeff Mosier, Dallas News, February 23, 2017

Dallas oil executive Christopher Faulkner, the self-titled “frack master” who federal authorities said ran an $80 million scam, was arrested Sunday in the Los Angeles area. Faulkner, 40, was taken into custody at 5:30 p.m. by Los Angeles Airport Police. No bail was listed.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department website said Faulkner was charged with a felony but no details were given. A sheriff’s spokeswoman referred questions to airport police.

News of the arrest was first reported on the TXsharon’s Bluedaze website run by Sharon Wilson, who was the first to publicly question Faulkner’s background and qualifications. The environmentalist and activist website is critical of gas drilling and has focused particularly on exploration locally in the Barnett Shale.

Faulkner’s lawyer, Larry Friedman of Friedman & Feiger, was not immediately available for comment Thursday morning. Friedman has previously said Faulkner did nothing wrong.

Frack Master Chris Faulkner Arrested on Felony Charges – Texas Sharon’s Bluedaze – https://t.co/oYWQNiGeHz via @Shareaholic#fracking

— TXsharon (@TXsharon) February 21, 2017

The federal Securities and Exchange Commission is suing Faulkner, the founder, president and CEO of Dallas-based Breitling Energy Corporation, along with seven other employees or associates. Breitling and three other related companies were also named in the complaint filed last summer.

Faulkner promoted himself, his “Frack Master” name and his company during dozens of cable TV appearances and at conferences from the United Arab Emirates to London. He was presented as a gas drilling expert and staunch defender of the industry against critics of hydraulic fracturing or fracking.

He had become such a go-to source that he was quoted as an expert in TheStreet.com more than a month after the SEC filed its complaint.

The federal civil complaint said Faulkner has little background in oil and gas and lied about his college degrees. The complaint also alleges that Faulkner and his employees inflated gas drilling costs and lied about likely production numbers.

The SEC also accused Faulkner of misappropriating at least $30 million in investor money to “maintain a lifestyle of decadence and debauchery.” One court document said Faulkner used a corporate American Express card — which he referred to as his “whore card” — to charge more than $1 million for strip clubs, escorts, nightclubs and personal travel.

Jeremy Wagers, Breitling’s chief operating officer and general counsel, used his business card to charge $40,000 at a Dallas strip club during a four-day period in July 2014, according to court filings.

The SEC has accused the Breitling crew of more than a dozen violations of federal securities laws and rules.

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net

Activist shareholder groups are pressing the drilling companies to reduce the risks of hydraulic fracturing, the drilling technique that is now being used in the Marcellus Shale formation of West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and New York. Huge volumes of previously inaccessible natural gas are released while raising concerns about environmental contamination of the land, water and air.

Investor groups said recently that they have filed resolutions with nine oil and gas companies that use hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” to extract gas from shale formations usually thousands of feet underground. Many critics contend that fracking has the potential to pollute  groundwater. Various industry companies have said that it is safe.

“Oil and gas firms are being too vague about how they will manage the environmental challenges resulting from fracking,” New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who manages the state’s  public worker pension fund, said in a statement.

The fund’s stake in two of the drillers — Carrizo Oil & Gas Inc. and Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. — is valued at nearly $35 million. New York, meanwhile, has declared a temporary moratorium on fracking to allow state regulators to issue new guidelines for shale gas extraction. See also this related story here.  And, the biggest disaster waiting to happen is the contamination of New York City’s water supply in the state’s Delaware Valley, described here.