R.L. Vallee CEO Skip Vallee inside a Maplefields convenience store in Colchester Credit: File: James Buck

Updated at 5:33 p.m.

Four years after they were accused of cheating customers out of $100 million, a group of Vermont gasoline distributors has agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit for a fraction of that amount.

The proposed settlement, filed Thursday in Vermont Superior Court, calls for the companies to pay $1.5 million to gasoline consumers in northwestern Vermont. Up to $500,000 of that could go to the lawyers who brought the suit and more could be subtracted for the cost of distributing the money.

The agreement, which must be approved by a judge, includes no admission of wrongdoing, though it requires the companies to abide by written antitrust policies and requires employees who set the price of petroleum products to undergo antitrust training. The defendants are R.L. Vallee, Inc., which owns the Maplefields gas station chain; S.B. Collins, Inc., which owns the Jolley chain; Champlain Farms/Wesco; and Champlain Oil Company, which operates Jiffy Mart-branded stores and was acquired last year by Massachusetts-based Global Partners.

Those who owned a car, bought gas from one of the four companies and lived in Chittenden, Franklin or Grand Isle counties between April 2012 and June 2015 are eligible to claim a portion of the funds. A settlement administrator was charged with contacting potential recipients, who can claim a standard amount or provide receipts or credit card statements showing how much gas they bought during the three-year period.

The suit, filed in June 2015 by Fairfax resident Jacob Kent and five other Vermonters, alleged that the companies had conspired to “fix the price of wholesale and retail gasoline in northwestern Vermont” at artificially high levels. At the time, they controlled more than 64 percent of gas stations in Chittenden, Franklin and Grand Isle counties and sometimes earned profits twice the national average, the plaintiffs alleged.

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The companies denied the charges and argued that prices in the region were, in fact, competitive. According to the settlement agreement, they “maintain that they have acted completely independently of each other, are competitors in the sale of gasoline, have not conspired in any way, have set gas prices fairly based on existing market forces, and did not violate any laws.”

In a written statement Thursday, R.L. Vallee CEO Rodolphe “Skip” Vallee said he and his codefendants had been “wrongly sued” and called the allegations “misguided” and “outrageous.”

“As we have said all along, we steadfastly, adamantly and completely deny the allegations in the complaint,” Vallee said in the statement. “After four years of litigation, involving the production of hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, hundreds of thousands of emails, and access to hundreds of witnesses of our company and others, there is not a single company email, document or witness documenting or testifying to price-fixing. There is no proof because it simply did not happen.”

Vallee, a major Republican donor and former U.S. ambassador to Slovakia, repeated his unproven assertion that U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) had ginned up the class-action suit for political purposes and unsuccessfully pushed then-attorney general Bill Sorrell to investigate R.L. Vallee. “If anything, [documents produced in discovery] testify to the political origins of this case, with a U.S. senator urging the Vermont attorney general to bring a case to make a political point,” Vallee said in the statement.

The settlement likely brings to an end a related fight in federal court between Vallee’s company and Sanders. R.L. Vallee had sought to compel a Sanders aide to turn over an array of documents related to the class-action suit and the senator’s political affairs. After a federal judge ruled against the company in June, R.L. Vallee vowed to appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, but the settlement of the underlying state lawsuit likely makes that impossible.

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Vermont politicians have for years inveighed against the high price of gas in the region. Sanders held a field hearing of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in Burlington in August 2012, and state lawmakers followed suit in January 2013 and January 2015. That summer, the national class-action law firm Bailey & Glasser and Burlington attorney Joshua Simonds filed suit against the Vermont companies.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Paul Heintz was part of the Seven Days news team from 2012 to 2020. He served as political editor and wrote the "Fair Game" political column before becoming a staff writer.

18 replies on “Vermont Gas Distributors to Settle Price-Fixing Lawsuit for $1.5 Million”

  1. A recent road trip showed that gas prices are still 20 to 40 cents higher per gallon in Chittenden and Washington Counties than in Rutland County. Why?

  3. No matter how much he denies it, pretty much everyone knows that Vallee is a crook with friends in high places so this is hardy surprising. Too bad it was settled for such a low amount while everyday Vermonters are still getting screwed.

  5. *A recent road trip showed that gas prices are still 20 to 40 cents higher per gallon in Chittenden and Washington Counties than in Rutland County. Why?

    Have you considered the following?

    1. Supply and demand. There are far more drivers per gas station in Chittenden County than in Rutland County. That naturally drives prices up.

    2. Government regulation. Where do you think its more difficult to build a new gas station, Rutland County or Chittenden County?

    3. Transportation costs. Burlington is further away from the fuel depots than Rutland is.

    Oh, and there is no place in the state where gasoline is 40 cents less than in Chittenden County.

  6. Notice lawyers come first, then they’re gonna ‘charge’ ungodly handling fees for distribution of the settlement. Then the customer is going to have to prove they bought the products, YEARS AGO. So the customer will end up with nothing.
    Been there, done that.
    Gas company down here advertised as a CITGO sold unbranded spot market gas, bought gas there every week ($30) on a CITGO credit card. They wouldn’t give me amout of charges for claim ended up with about $11.00.
    BTW, what about out of state purchasers?

  8. Considering it was an out of state Class Action law firm promising $100 million, it tells you something that those sharks walked away with just over 1% of their “claim” after 4 years work.

    Lawyers get theirs first, because these CA suits are all about that: lawyers promising the sky on a fabricated allegation (“Hey, gas prices are higher in the most expensive place to live in VT! I’m shocked!”) in hopes of draining big companies of millions in legal costs knowing they will eventually settle for far less than the cost of fighting.

  9. Here we go again ladies and gentlemen. Hey skippy you and your buddies got lucky. Love to see how much skippy and his buddies gave GOVERNoRs campaign. This is a scratch my back favor from Mr. Scott. I find it funny he is also fighting the new Divergence Diamond in Colchester. Afraid he might lose business to COSTCO. Never thought Id see a company like COSTCO looking out for the local Vermonter Once they get gas pumps up and running its over. Local Vermonters have been getting screwed. Change starts with you. STOP giving them business, and force them to change. BOYCOTT and give your business to some else .

  12. “Know your assumptions” claims that “There are far more drivers per gas station in Chittenden County than in Rutland County. That naturally drives prices up.” He explains this via “Supply and Demand.”

    When demand goes up, prices “naturally” go up IF AND ONLY IF supply doesn’t. If supply can rise to meet demand, the prices don’t go up. Otherwise, mass produced products would cost more and more as they achieve wider distribution. In fact, the exact opposite is often true, which is a large part of why the price of solar panels, for example, is declining.

    I don’t follow this Chittenden gasoline issue very carefully, since I live in the Banana Belt), but I thought the whole argument was that those fixing prices are controlling supply so that it can’t rise to meet demand.

    The 2nd argument concerns “Government regulation,” which similarly misses the point. Unless he can show that Burlington has far stricter zoning regulations than Rutland, the regulation in question is statewide: largely, Act 250. So if it’s true that it is “more difficult to build a new gas station” in Rutland County, the pertinent question is: Why? Again, unless I’m missing something, the assertion here is that the price-fixers are MAKING the Chittenden process more difficult, not that there is some inherent difference.

    Finally, the additional transportation cost (if any — where is it coming from?) might account for a tiny difference, if it accounts for more than a penny or two in either direction, I’d like to see the math. Given that trucks going to Burlington can remain on the interstate all the way, while those headed to Rutland cannot, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to learn that transportation to Rutland actually costs more, not less.

  13. Yet another case of sleezebag suits contriving a class action where in the end, they walk off with 90% of the cash and all the victims wind up with a check for $1.63. Whether there was price fixing or not, this is just vulture litigation in action.

    “As we have said all along, we steadfastly, adamantly and completely deny the allegations in the complaint,” Vallee said in the statement. ” – So then why did you settle, instead of forcing them to prove their claim and charging the vultures with frivolous litigation when they couldn’t?

  16. These mini mart gas stations these crooks operate should not be surprised when customers start regularly going into these gas station markets and begin removing small items serupticiously, as part of the reneumeration settlement. You have been able to buy gas in the middle of the NE kingdom for YEARS for less than what a station on Shelburne RD sells it for. And distribution costs are something like 45% of the retail price for gas.

  17. Now I know why I’ve kept book on my gas purchases and saved receipts all these years! I’d just like to see the settlement force Vallee to drop his suit against Costco. The pumps are in place and ready to go.

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