In yet another theatrical act of lawfare against the fossil fuel industry, Misti Leon has launched a wrongful death lawsuit against seven oil and gas companies, alleging they were responsible for the tragic passing of her mother, Juliana Leon, during the 2021 Pacific Northwest heatwave. The legal argument? That anthropogenic emissions from these companies directly caused the heatwave and therefore, her mother’s death. This suit, announced on May 29, 2025, marks a new chapter in the ongoing campaign to litigate weather.
The idea that any single heatwave—or any isolated weather event—can be laid at the feet of specific industrial actors stretches credulity. But this isn’t about evidence. It’s about constructing a politically useful narrative. The 2021 heatwave, which indeed brought record-breaking temperatures to the region, is now being used as a legal battering ram against energy producers. But the scientific scaffolding behind this claim is conspicuously hollow.
The event in question occurred in June 2021, when temperatures in the Pacific Northwest surged past 108°F. Juliana Leon died in her vehicle on a sweltering day in Ferndale, Washington, with a broken air conditioner and windows rolled down—a tragic circumstance exacerbated by her recent bariatric surgery and increased vulnerability to heat. The lawsuit alleges that oil companies failed to warn the public about the dangers of climate change and actively sowed doubt about the “consensus” on global warming. Yet none of this explains why individual risk factors, personal decisions, and public weather warnings play no role in the plaintiff’s logic. It’s a crude scapegoating operation masquerading as justice.
On the scientific front, the lawsuit relies on a distorted interpretation of “climate attribution science”—a burgeoning field that attempts to assign probabilistic blame for weather events to human activities. In the immediate aftermath of the heatwave, NOAA analysts called it a “1,000-year event,” with some attributing its occurrence to man-made climate change. But more rigorous follow-ups told a different story.
A 2024 study published in Nature Communications makes clear that the 2021 event defied conventional climate modeling. The authors describe the heatwave as a statistical and dynamical outlier—so extreme that it exposed fundamental weaknesses in current modeling frameworks. Specifically, their simulations could not reproduce an event of similar magnitude under standard greenhouse gas forcing scenarios. The study notes:
“We find that the models analyzed largely fail to simulate events as extreme as the 2021 heatwave. This discrepancy calls into question their ability to assess the frequency and drivers of such events accurately.”
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/wefo/39/2/WAF-D-23-0154.1.xml
This is not a ringing endorsement of attribution science—it is a direct indictment of its limitations.
Even the World Weather Attribution (WWA) group, typically eager to draw a straight line between emissions and extreme weather, conceded that this particular heatwave exceeded their models’ capabilities. They went as far as to speculate about unknown feedback mechanisms—an admission that the scientific community doesn’t fully understand what happened, much less why. The authors of the Nature paper went further, calling the event a “Black Swan,” a chaotic one-off driven more by atmospheric randomness than CO₂ levels.
But nuance isn’t useful when constructing a climate morality play. Instead, the lawsuit conflates correlation with causation, implying that the presence of emissions means culpability for any and all associated weather extremes. The plaintiff’s lawyers want it both ways: they allege the event would not have happened without climate change and simultaneously argue that climate change merely worsened it. Which is it? As meteorologist Ryan Maue wryly noted, “You can’t argue both. Pick one.”
Equally problematic is the suit’s attempt to pin liability on oil companies for not publicizing the dangers of climate change. This overlooks the elephant in the room: forecasts for the heatwave were accurate, publicly disseminated, and well-publicized. The National Weather Service issued timely warnings. If there was a failure, it was not one of awareness. Juliana Leon tragically encountered a lethal environment, but the proximate causes—lack of A/C, personal health risks, and direct exposure—don’t involve ExxonMobil or Chevron.
This suit is emblematic of a growing trend in climate litigation: ignore the uncertainties, simplify the science, and vilify an industry. As the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law gleefully documents, more legal cases are targeting fossil fuel companies—not for direct environmental harm, but for their alleged ideological noncompliance. “Disinformation,” “denial,” and “deception” are the new torts.
What’s at stake here isn’t compensation or justice; it’s control. These lawsuits are tools of policy-making by other means. Unable to pass sweeping Green New Deal-style reforms legislatively, climate activists are turning to the courts to impose de facto regulations through liability judgments. If successful, this lawsuit could open the door to endless claims—each one blaming oil producers for everything from floods to frostbite.
Make no mistake: Juliana Leon’s death is a tragedy. But exploiting it as a cudgel in the unscientific crusade of climate attribution is an abuse of both science and law. If the courts lend credence to such spurious reasoning, they won’t just be sanctioning junk science—they’ll be encouraging it.
This is lawfare dressed in climate robes, and it’s time to call it what it is: a cynical, opportunistic campaign built not on facts, but on fervor.
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She died while she was in her car. Presumably the car used gasoline.
That reminds me of a case that I did some expert witness work on for my employer, major oil company that rhymes with hell. It involved a customer that sued for slipping and falling at one of our filling stations. I analyzed hydrocarbons on the bottom of the customer’s shoes.
We didn’t disclose it, but it turns out that the soles of the customer’s shoes were made of a polymer that we produced at a plant in Ohio.
We settled out of court.
Presumably she either filled the tank herself or asked someone to do it. Is that contributory negligence, according to the “logic” of the lawsuit?
If it didn’t use gasoline, then the EV maker failed to warn the driver that the air conditioner might not operate at some point in the future. Anyone can have fun with twisting liability!
Hmmm…
If the Models are reliable sources for Global Warming Data…
And are good predictors of future climate…
But failed to predict such an outlier weather event…
Was the event then even Climate Related???
If she was so old and frail as to be susceptible to a heat event…
Should she have been driving???
Shouldn’t her Children have been responsible to ensure proper maintenance of her auto’s A/C system???
Was she driving an EV or ICV?
If ICV then isn’t she equally responsible for emissions from the use of gasoline?
It was, and still is, an outlier. I’m on Whidbey Island, about 70 miles north of Seattle, as the crow flies. Yes, it was hot. We don’t get quite as hot as the mainland, but it got very close to 100F. For maybe 2 days.
Since then, it’s been pretty cool. Last summer barely got into the 70s.
I am vulnerable to excess warmth. It’s pretty warm outside. My car’s airco is not working but hey I can open the window. Let’s go for a ride; what could possibly go wrong?
Yawn …. another climate lawfare suit. I’m believing the attorneys in these cases are hoping to hit the mega jackpot with a win is the only reason they continue.
Actually, the attorneys for the plaintiffs aren’t really aiming for a win, but instead just for big dollar settlements. While this case makes the blunder with their new tactic of offering a ‘victim’ who was recovering from a just-two-weeks-prior major surgery, they still repeat the same old blunders seen in all the other “ExxonKnew” lawsuits — Exxon couldn’t have known as far back as the 1970s about the harm of fossil fuels causing global warming because those were the days of global cooling; and, this lawsuit regurgitates the same pair of baseless accusations seen in the other lawsuits (a particular set of ‘leaked industry memos’ / ‘Exxon bribery of Willie Soon’) about ‘industry-led disinformation campaigns.’ It’s a matter of time until one of these gets hit with a Motion to Dismiss because a viable case is not presented to support those latter claims. This one simply piles on with one more utterly laughable ‘wrongful death’ claim.
My dissection of all these faults is here: Estate of Juliana Leon v Exxon Mobil Corporation
“Make no mistake: Juliana Leon’s death is a tragedy. But exploiting it as a cudgel in the unscientific crusade of climate attribution is an abuse of both science and law.”
It’s not “climate” attribution anymore, so much as extreme weather event attribution. The latter depends on the former being valid to the extent that emissions of CO2 are conceded to have at least contributed to the reported warming.
The oil companies – and all skeptics of climate alarm, in my view – should stop conceding the “climate” part. No one knows that. The valid null hypothesis is that the static radiative absorbing power of incremental CO2 in the atmosphere will exhibit no capability to drive sensible heat gain on land, in the oceans, or in the atmosphere itself as an end result. That null hypothesis has not been falsified by reliable means. The models don’t do it. The IR spectral properties and observations don’t do it. The “effective radiating level” concept doesn’t do it. And there is ample evidence that the operation of the atmosphere as the compressible working fluid of its own circulation massively overwhelms any tendency toward that result from the rising concentration of non-condensing IR-active gases.
Thank you for listening.
Love the way you put it. 🙂
Air movement massively overwhelms any fantasy CO2 warming.
90% of lawyers make the rest look bad.
Don’t you mean 97%?
Lawyers harvest a crop that is well supplied with fertilizer, and since they largely also pen the laws that serve as cropland, they can exploit both the supply and demand of their produce.
Despite it being “scary” sounding, it is my understanding that a “1,000 year event” defines a weather occurence that statistically is expected only once in 1,000 years IN THAT PARTICULAR WEATHER DISTRICT, not once in a thousand years anywhere in the world – which is what they want the public to believe.
20 years ago when living on a hillside in the Finger Lakes region of NY we had a deluge that tore through a small stream in the middle of my property, knocking out substantial culverts that allowed access to the other half of my rural property. It was deemed a “100 year” event; not that such a flood only occurs once in a hundred years anywhere in the world, but that particular stream had that probability of such damage reoccurring.
A 1-in-1000 year rain rate is not a rain rate that occurs only once every 1000 years. It is, instead, a rain rate that has a 0.1% chance of occurring at that location in any given year.
Thank you for pointing out the correct interpretation.
It should be noted that it is possible to have more than one such event in a year
It should also be noted that a 1000 year event is equivalent to certain volume of flood water or rainfall for that particular location.
In Houston there is a 100 year flood event every 5 years.
Don’t know what the Average Expected Probability of the rainfall we have had in the Hunter and mid north coast in the last 2 weeks..
…. but it was exceptionally WET. !
Taree and coastal town further north from me to the brunt of it, with many people’ houses flooded. I think its now 4 or 5 dead 🙁
A friend in the Raymond Terrace area sent me this pic of the bridge west out of RT..
Most main roads are now open again as floods subside.
I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
Dorothy Mackellar, she wrote this over a hundred years ago. Wonder why.
It is my understanding that a “(Fill in a number) year event” is a term used for some time by those working in the field who understood what it meant and that it wasn’t “literal”.
But it started to be used to describe an event to the public and the misunderstandings began.
I’m in the State of Washington about 100 miles SE of Seattle. My high that week was 116°F. I don’t recall dying.
After living in Northern California for most of my adult years, it is my experience that above about 110 deg F, in a car without air conditioning, it is more comfortable to roll up the windows while driving. That has happened many times. On two occasions, I probably experienced temperatures of around 120 deg F. Those were both in the 1970s and late-60s. I lived through both, although one time we spent most of the day frolicking in the North Fork of the American River near Auburn.
Recovering from bariatric surgery? So she was overweight, likely seriously so. This is a major risk factor for heat waves. Did the oil companies provide her food?
And shouldn’t such lawsuits really be called barratry?
Driving without air con in 108F heat would indeed be quite unpleasant but I would not have expected it to be lethal for a healthy person. Depends on the humidity, of course.
If recovering from major surgery and with severe health issues, or if 70+ and frail, that would be a different matter – then it could be very risky.
Problem is, even if you manage to establish that those particular high temps were caused by or contributed to by emissions, you then encounter further problems about attribution to the particular companies.
The filing names Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell, BP, Conoco Phillips, Phillips 66 and BP subsidiary Olympic Pipeline Company.
How large is their contribution to the warming? I doubt if it is plausible that they have done more than a few percent of total human emissions, between them.
Then you have the problem, was it the hot day that caused her death? She was an older lady, and appears to have driven 200 miles on a 108F day, without working air conditioning, and while recovering from major surgery. With air con she’d probably have been fine, without health issues she’d probably have been fine too, even with no air con. Driving 50 miles even as she was she’d probably have been fine.
It was an unwise thing to do, for anyone in her condition.
Its a bit like going for a hike in the mountains in winter, not adequately dressed, older, and without taking food or drink. Yes, you die of hypothermia. But was it really the cold day that killed you? Lots of others went for walks that same day and were fine. The weather was not lethal, its what I did in it that was.
It may be difficult for her family to accept it, but it seems like a case where her action in her particular circumstances led to her death. Its entirely understandable. When we are older and in ill health, and the weather is so exceptional, it is easy to underestimate the risks of what seems like a perfectly ordinary proceeding. But its not, or not for us, or not any longer for us, or not in this particular weather.
Its a tragedy all right, but its hard to blame either the weather, climate change or these particular companies. If I were the family I would be berating myself for not having got the air con fixed, and for not having dissuaded her from driving that far in those particular days.
Imagine a similar example. I am warned to leave my house because of a coming hurricane. I refuse. The storm comes in and demolishes it and I die. Did the storm kill me? Or did I wrongly, for whatever reason, decide to stay, and it was my decision to take the chance that killed me?
Oh, the victim blaming again.
/sarc
Next up, I guess: Swiss Grannies Against Climate Change sue for loss of Blatten.
Will we see “The court ruled that Switzerland’s inadequate response to climate change, specifically its failure to protect citizens from mountain collapse, violated their right to health and life”? The BBC Big Climate Machine is already on the case, having dug out a “leading glacier specialist” (Matthias Huss) to “link” the mountain’s collapse to “global warming”.
EDIT: I was alluding the case of the Swiss Grannies & Greta v Switzerland in April 2024. I now read that the Swiss parliament’s lower house voted on June 2024 to disregard the court ruling – with 111 votes in favour and 72 against – arguing that the judges had overstepped their bounds, a vote which sent the alarmist media into a rage.
Examination of the pictures showing the valley reveals that what was once probably a U-shaped valley, is now V-shaped. There are numerous incidences of tongues of landslides, hummocky and tree-covered, encroaching on the valley floor. That is, landslides have been occurring there for far longer than any of the residents can remember.
In a nasty but inarguably certain way, the lady was involved with two sets of hydrocarbons, being those produced by the oil companies and those produced by her own body, with a recent need for surgery to remove some of the latter because it was deemed medically harmful.
Good luck to a judge and jury trying to decide which group of hydrocarbons was the prime cause of death in terms of proximity, diagnosed harm, corrective measures and plain logic.
Geoff S
Shame on her daughter for trying to get rich off her mother’s death
‘Juliana Leon’s death is a tragedy’. I disagree after reading the article.
She was 65. She was obese or would not have qualified for ‘recent bariatric surgery’. Old obese people die from lots of things, not just heat waves.
Is than anything like being less pregnant?
I have no sympathy for Misti Leon. Did the oil companies burn the fossil fuel or did all of us burn fossil fuels including Misti’s family and if we didn’t far more would have died do to heat but mostly due to cold. Without fossil fuels Misti would freeze to death in the dark.
Lawfare may be the true perpetual motion machine or a higher form of parasitic evolution.
Arizona residents are watching this one closely for the reparations potential from the local shopping center asphalt parking lot (that Amazon has now obviated).