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Alma Shields
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ALMA SHIELDS

Shareholder

,
Houston
T  713.651.2974
ashields@liskow.com
Connect with me
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Practices

  • Appellate
  • Labor & Employment
  • Litigation
  • Contract & Quasi-Contract Disputes
  • Oil & Gas Marketing Disputes
  • Energy – Litigation
  • Blowouts & Well Control Issues
  • Land Loss Litigation
  • Landowner & Mineral Lessee Disputes
  • Personal Injury
  • Pipeline Litigation
  • Refinery Incidents & Litigation
  • Royalty Litigation
  • Toxic Tort, Mass Torts & Class Actions
  • Products Liability
  • Unfair Trade Practices & Business Torts
  • eDiscovery
  • Pipeline Servitude, Rights-of-way, Easements & Expropriation
  • Commercial Litigation
  • Maritime Litigation & Casualty Response

Esmeralda Moreno

713.651.2959

“Since the beginning of my legal career, I’ve been working with clients in the energy sector. That focus has allowed me to become very familiar with the industry and understand how energy companies operate. My industry knowledge, combined with my attention to detail, allows me to offer an effective balance between focusing on the big picture and managing the small details.”

Overview

Alma represents energy clients in a variety of complex matters and disputes. Her experience is concentrated on appeals, as well as trials and alternative dispute resolution.

Alma’s energy experience includes royalty litigation, disputes between co-owners, including joint operating agreement disputes, acquisition and divestiture disputes, land ownership and title disputes, and fiduciary duty claims.

Her commercial litigation experience includes products liability, premises liability, general contractual disputes, indemnity disputes, and personal injury. For example, she has been regularly retained by commercial property owners and managers in premises liability cases involving multiple parties and extensive personal injury. She has also represented energy clients in their claims against manufacturers and suppliers for manufacturing defects and failure to warn allegations arising from oilfield equipment and pipeline failure. Alma has regularly represented clients in the enforcement of contractual indemnity obligations, including obtaining and enforcing insurance coverage as additional insureds pursuant to the terms of master service agreements.

Alma’s commercial litigation experience also includes litigating breach of contract and damages disputes, breach of warranty, breach of fiduciary duty, negligent misrepresentation, and fraud in connection with commercial transactions.

In addition to her energy and commercial litigation practice, Alma also has maritime and casualty experience, defending death and personal injury cases not only onshore, but also, offshore, and specifically, representing clients in cases involving the Jones Act, the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act and the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. 

Talks about

#energylitigation #royaltylitigation #indemnification #commerciallitigation #productsliability

Notable Experience

  • Defended operators in royalty disputes including allegations regarding breach of lease based on improper deductions and accounting, failure to appropriately market production, fraud and conversion
  • Defended against request for class certification in royalty litigation pending before the Southern District of Texas
  • Represented major oil and gas companies in their products liability lawsuits against manufacturers and resellers. For example, Alma successfully defended her client against dispositive motions in the Western District of Louisiana, which led to multi-million-dollar settlement for damages arising out of the failure of a coupling used in the company’s offshore oil and gas well
  • Obtained summary judgment finding operator owed no duty to personal injury claimant and thus, could not be held negligent
  • Obtained summary judgment for major oil and gas company in breach of contract case relating to the application and limitation of a liquidated damages clause and successfully defended the judgment at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals
  • Defended jury verdict, finding breach of commercial lease in favor of client, at Dallas Court of Appeals
  • Successfully appealed previous granting of summary judgment against client before the Houston Court of Appeals
  • Negotiated settlements of cases involving personal injuries, and oil and gas royalty, commercial lease, and other contractual disputes
  • Successfully argued multiple dispositive motions in a variety of cases, including contractual, oil and gas lease, and commercial lease disputes
  • Represented energy clients during audits and litigation relating to the payment of royalties

Involvement

Professional

  • The Foundation For Natural Resources and Energy Law, Member
  • Women’s Energy Network, Houston Chapter - Former Board of Directors, Sponsorship Director, 2020-2021, Current Member
  • Houston Bar Association – Gender Fairness Committee, Past Member, 2014-2018
  • Houston Young Lawyers Association
  • American Bar Association – Section of Litigation, Young Advocates Committee, Past Member
  • Texas Association of Defense Counsel – Young Lawyer Committee
  • Institute for Energy Law – Young Energy Professionals, Member, Advisory Board, 2024

Community

  • Friends of CanCare – Board Member and President

Recognition

  • The Best Lawyers in America®, Litigation - Labor & Employment, 2025
  • Texas Super Lawyers "Rising Stars," 2023
  • Institute for Energy Law, 2nd Leadership Class, 2019

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Credentials

Education

  • The University of Texas School of Law (J.D., with Honors, 2009)
    • Women's Law Caucus
    • Chicano/Hispanic Law Students Association
    • Texas Hispanic Journal of Law and Policy, Staff Member
  • University of Texas at Austin (B.A., with Highest Honors, 2005)

Bar Admissions

  • Texas, 2009

Court Admissions

  • U.S. District Court, Eastern District, Texas
  • U.S. District Court, Northern District, Texas
  • U.S. District Court, Southern District, Texas
  • U.S. District Court, Western District, Texas
  • U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit

Presentations

  • "Frequently Litigated Provisions in MSAs," Liskow's Energy Law Seminar, October 26, 2023, Houston, TX
  • "Texas Oil and Gas Matters," Liskow's Energy Law Seminar, October 29, 2019
  • “Wage, Hour and Other Employment Law Issues in the Oil and Gas Industry,” Liskow & Lewis, Breakfast Forum Series, April 21, 2015

Publications

  • Institute for Energy Law's The Energy Law Advisor - September 2023 Issue
  • "One Man’s Waste Is Another Man’s Treasure: Texas Appellate Court Holds That Produced Water Belongs To Mineral Owners," Liskow's The Energy Law Blog, August 4, 2023
  • “Texas Supreme Court Holds That Production Payments Were Properly Withheld as a Matter of Law When a Future Event Could Have Affected Distribution of Those Payments,” Liskow's The Energy Law Blog, June 9, 2023
  • "Force Majeure Clause Fails to Protect Oil and Gas Lessee From Mistakenly-Scheduled Deadline," Liskow's The Energy Law Blog, May 5, 2023
  • "Texas Supreme Court Holds that Add-Back Provision in Oil and Gas Lease Required Royalties to be Paid on Prices in Excess of the Producers’ Gross Proceeds," Liskow's The Energy Law Blog, March 15, 2023
  • "Texas Supreme Court Holds that References to “One-Eighth” in Old Oil and Gas Conveyances Presumptively Refer to the Entire Mineral Estate," Liskow's The Energy Law Blog, March 7, 2023

After Hours

"In my spare time, I enjoy trying new restaurants and am always looking for another recipe to master.  I am involved in a local Houston based charity called CanCare that matches newly diagnosed cancer patients with survivors of the same type and provides additional support to those patients and their families."

WHAT’S TRENDING WITH Alma

  • News
    08.15.24
    118 Liskow Lawyers Recognized in The Best Lawyers in America® (BL Rankings) 2025
    5 minute read
  • News
    08.17.23
    114 Liskow Lawyers Recognized in The Best Lawyers in America® (BL Rankings) 2024
    5 minute read
  • Blogs
    08.04.23
    One Man’s Waste is Another Man’s Treasure: Texas Appellate Court Holds that Produced Water Belongs to Mineral Owners
    7 minute read
  • Blogs
    06.09.23
    Texas Supreme Court Holds That Production Payments Were Properly Withheld as a Matter of Law When a Future Event Could Have Affected Distribution of Those Payments
    5 minute read
  • Blogs
    05.05.23
    Force Majeure Clause Fails to Protect Oil and Gas Lessee From Mistakenly-Scheduled Deadline
    6 minute read
  • Blogs
    03.15.23
    Texas Supreme Court Holds that Add-Back Provision in Oil and Gas Lease Required Royalties to be Paid on Prices in Excess of the Producers’ Gross Proceeds
    8 minute read
  • Blogs
    03.07.23
    Texas Supreme Court Holds that References to “One-Eighth” in Old Oil and Gas Conveyances Presumptively Refer to the Entire Mineral Estate
    5 minute read
  • News
    08.06.19
    Liskow Lawyers Selected to Institute for Energy Law’s Leadership Class
    less than a minute
  • News
    01.02.18
    Liskow & Lewis Announces Three New Shareholders
    less than a minute
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