YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – The lawsuit filed by the mother and sister of a Chase Bank employee killed in the Realty Tower natural gas explosion last May has been settled, according to one of the attorneys involved in the case.
“The Akil Drake matter is settled,” said Ben Whitman of Florida, one of the attorneys representing Sharnette Crite-Evans and Traesha Danyiel Pritchard, administratrix of the estate of Akil Drake.
Drake, who was an employee of the Chase Bank branch that was on the first floor of the Realty Tower, died when a natural gas line exploded May 28, 2024. Whitman said the agreement must be approved in Mahoning County Probate Court before it is final.
“What I can say is that we were able to reach confidential settlements with the named defendants in our case,” Whitman said Monday.
He declined to provide details.
“Since we were retained in the days after the incident, we immediately launched a very detailed investigation and filed our case very quickly after the incident. We were the first to file, and we were able to coordinate very professionally and quickly with the defendants and were able to reach amicable settlement agreements,” the attorney said.
The wrongful death lawsuit listed as defendants Yo Properties 47 LLC, the property owner; LY Property Management LLC; GreenHeart Companies LLC; East Ohio Gas Co.; Enbridge Elephant Holdings; Enbridge Alternatives Fuel LLC; Enbridge Pipelines Inc.; Enbridge Genoa U.S. Holdings LLC; Enbridge Inc.; Enbridge Gas Distribution LLC; Dominion Energy Questar Corp.; and Dominion Energy Inc.
GreenHeart was contracted by the city of Youngstown to relocate utility lines, including gas lines from the basement and vault of the Realty building. A natural gas line that had been abandoned but had gas in it was cut before the explosion, according to preliminary information from the National Transportation Safety Board. Why the abandoned line was pressurized is part of the NTSB’s investigation.
The explosion also injured several others and displaced the residents of the building’s 23 apartments who weren’t allowed to reenter their homes after that day. Residents of International Towers, located next to where Realty stood, were evacuated for several days because of concerns that Realty would collapse.
The Realty building was demolished last summer.
Seven other cases stemming from the explosion are pending. Those cases were filed by others who were injured and residents of Realty Tower and International Towers.
Attorneys in those cases met behind closed doors Monday afternoon with Judge W. Wyatt McKay, a retired Trumbull County Common Pleas Court judge who is assigned to hear the cases.
The judge said the NTSB investigation is limiting parties’ discovery in the cases.
“They’re under orders from a federal organization that they can’t discuss the case,” he said. “But we’re proceeding anyway.”
He set 2:30 p.m. Aug. 8 for a status conference in the still-pending cases.
Pictured at top: A Chase Bank sign is seen on the Realty Tower after the May 28 explosion at the building.