News & Analysis
November 3, 2025
The first-ever lawsuit seeking to hold Big Oil companies accountable for the death of a family member in a climate disaster will continue moving forward in Washington State court, after a judge rejected fossil fuel companies’ arguments to move the case to federal court.
Misti Leon sued ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Shell, and other oil and gas companies in May for fueling the extreme heat that killed her mother, Julie Leon, on the hottest day in Washington State history during the 2021 Pacific Northwest heat dome that scientists found would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change.
The temperature rose above 100 degrees for the third consecutive day on June 28, 2021, when Julie was driving home from a doctor’s appointment in Seattle, Washington. Julie was later found unresponsive in her car with the windows down, parked along her route home – and despite several rounds of life-saving measures, she could not be revived. The medical examiner ruled Julie’s cause of death as hyperthermia — a condition that killed hundreds of people during the heat dome.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Marsha J. Pechman sided with Leon when she ruled that her case against Big Oil could advance in state court, where it was originally filed.
"This is an important step toward putting these companies on trial and securing accountability for the Leon family," Timothy Bechtold, an attorney representing Misti Leon, told Law360.
The case cites decades of disinformation that Big Oil peddled throughout Julie’s life in order to obscure the reality of climate science and delay climate action. Fossil fuel companies knew in the 1950s — the same decade Julie was born — that their products fuel the escalating climate harms we’re experiencing today. But the companies failed to warn the public about the risks of using their fossil fuel products, the lawsuit argues, and caused the conditions that claimed Julie’s life.
