Prior to June 1996, the company was very assertive that they would be recognized as the "owner" of LC. The biggest supporter was Carson and subsequent events is why most of the old-timers don't trust him. In June 1996 there was a negative (suprising?) ruling from the Venezuela Supreme Court rejecting KRY's lawsuit and crashing the price from, if I recall correctly, from around $4.00 to $0.37 cents. KRY chose to continue their legal fight.

Placerdome had control of LC at this time and even once had Chavez attend a ribbon-cutting ceremony on the premises. They then proceeded to do nothing to develop the property (low gold prices at this time). This ticked off the VE government and they stripped PDG of their rights when PDG sold their rights to LC to Vanessa for $50, (plus some buyback ability). This was all before ABX bought PDG.

KRY never stopped pursueing their legal claim to ownership. Eventually the operating contract was negotiated and awarded to KRY: as part of the deal, KRY agreed to drop all legal proceedings to enforce its ownership claims.