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LSU Law alum, Adjunct Professor Ottinger honored with LSU Mineral Law Institute Distinguished Service Award

Mineral Law Institute Director Keith Hall presents Adjunct Professor Patrick Ottinger with the LSU Mineral Law Institute Distinguished Service Award.

Since 1996, LSU Law alumnus (’73) and Adjunct Professor Patrick Ottinger has taught the Mineral Rights course and an Oil and Gas Seminar titled “Anatomy of an Oil and Gas Transaction” at his alma mater, where he was also a founding member of the LSU John P. Laborde Energy Law Center.

Ottinger was recognized for his invaluable service to LSU Law and the Energy Law Center during the opening day of the 69th Mineral Law Institute on Thursday, May 31, and was honored with the LSU Mineral Law Institute Distinguished Service Award.

“No practicing lawyer has contributed more to mineral law education in Louisiana than Pat Ottinger. He has authored two chapters in a treatise on Louisiana oil and gas law, in addition to his own treatise on oil and gas leases, a casebook on Louisiana oil and gas law, several scholarly papers for the Mineral Law Institute, several articles for the Louisiana Law Review, and multiple articles for LSU Journal of Energy Law and Resources,” said Professor Keith Hall, who serves as director of the Mineral Law Institute. “He served for more than a decade on the Mineral Law Institute’s Advisory Council, including several years as Chairman. He also taught Mineral Rights as an adjunct professor for more than a decade. He did all this while also being one of the most prominent oil and gas practitioners in Louisiana. It is an amazing feat, and one for which the oil and gas community is very grateful.”

The Mineral Law Institute established the Distinguished Service Award in 2014 to honor individuals who have rendered extraordinary service to the Mineral Law Institute or mineral law education. The award is not granted every year, but is granted when the institute’s advisory council makes a determination that some individual’s service should be given special recognition.

Ottinger is a founding partner of the Ottinger Hebert lawfirm in Lafayette, where his professional practice is concentrated in onshore and offshore oil and gas, and renewable energy projects, as well as corporate, banking and commercial matters, with emphasis on financial transactions, project financing, real estate, eminent domain, and mediation, arbitration and litigation in these areas. Formed in 2000 with an oil and gas focus, the firm has grown to serve businesses, individuals, and municipalities in transactional, regulatory and litigation matters.

Along with his most recent honor, LSU Law recognized Ottinger as a 2014 Distinguished Achievement Honoree. He received the Friend of Pro Bono Award from the Louisiana State Bar Association in an award ceremony at the Louisiana Supreme Court in 2011 and was inducted into the Lafayette Bar Association’s Hall of Fame in 2017. In 2018, he was awarded the Louisiana Bar Foundation’s 2018 Curtis R. Boisfontaine Trial Advocacy Award at the Annual Meeting of the Louisiana State Bar Association, awarded for “long-standing devotion to and excellence in trial practice,” and “upholding the standards of ethics and consideration for the courts, litigants and all counsel.”

Previous recipients of the LSU Mineral Law Institute Distinguished Service Award include:

  • Mark Dupuy Jr. (’54)
  • Lanny Yeates (’81)
  • Tom Harrell (’51)
  • John M. McCollam
  • Arnold Johnson
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