Justice family files lawsuit to defend control of Greenbrier from receivership threat

The Justices sued White Sulphur Springs Holdings LLC, an affiliate of TRT Holdings, Dallas-based parent company of Omni Hotels & Resorts, three days after White Sulphur Springs filed a federal lawsuit seeking receivership for The Greenbrier hotel and network of related companies.

In addition to TRT Holdings itself, the Justices have sued Robert and Blake Rowling, father and son billionaire owners of the Omni properties, TRT Holdings executive vice president Michael Smith, and Carter Bank, the Martinsville, Virginia-based bank that sold the Justices’ loans to White Sulphur Springs Holdings.

The Justices in their complaint seek cancellation of what they claim was an unlawful sale by Carter Bank of their loans to the defendants and the right to pay off the loans “at a fair price.�

Revealed Friday, the receivership request from the newly formed White Sulphur Springs Holdings follows it buying $289.48 million in loans, subsequently reduced to judgments, related to entities in which Justice had an interest, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing last month from the seller of the loans, Carter Bankshares Inc., parent company of Carter Bank.

White Sulphur Springs Holdings is seeking “the immediate appointment of a receiver� over each of the Justice family’s companies with the authority to seize control of the firms, assets and operations, the right to start further legal proceedings regarding other non-debtors, and a permanent injunction to prevent the Justices and their current businesses from any actions that hinder the receiver’s authority to operate the companies.

But the Justices in their new lawsuit claim the defendants are trying to “pilfer one of West Virginia’s crown jewels� by pursuing the receivership.

Justice admits to agreeing to cede Greenbrier management

The Justices’ complaint claims that in a March 27, 2026, phone conversation with Jim Justice, Robert Rowling indicated the defendants “wanted to work cooperatively with the Justice family and identify ways to work together at The Greenbrier.�

The complaint states that on April 6, the Rowlings and Smith met with Jim Justice at The Greenbrier, where Blake Rowling claimed that TRT Holdings “wanted to find a way to work cooperatively with The Greenbrier and the Justice family.�

The defendants agreed The Greenbrier had the right to pay off the loans by April 15 for about $341 million — the amount specified in the most recent agreement regarding the loans, according to the complaint.

Robert Rowling offered an arrangement later in the meeting in which the defendants would forgive $200 million of the plaintiffs’ loans in exchange for a 50% ownership interest in The Greenbrier, the complaint states.

The Justices say Jim Justice “responded favorably to� Robert Rowling’s proposal, which they say became an offer of:

• TRT forgiving $200 million of The Greenbrier’s loans

• TRT and its affiliates becoming a 50% owner of The Greenbrier

• TRT and its affiliates being the general partner of a joint venture between the Justice family

• TRT managing the operations of The Greenbrier

• The Justice family retaining a significant role at The Greenbrier

• The Justice family receiving, free of debt, coal assets from Carter in which TRT purportedly acquired secured interests from Carter Bank

Jim Justice agreed to the offer, the complaint on his behalf states, before TRT “abruptly reversed course� the next day, sending an email in which it reneged on its offer.

The Justices claim they responded by obtaining terms from another lender to provide the funds to pay off the loans in the agreed-upon amount, asking and getting from TRT wiring instructions for payoff before asking TRT for confirmation of the exact payoff amount.

But the Justices say the defendants on Thursday sent The Greenbrier a notice of default and forbearance termination citing what the Justices claim were “several baseless grounds for the purported default� — a move they claim was engineered to keep them from paying off the loans at the $341 million payoff the defendants had agreed to three days earlier.

The Justices have asked the Greenbrier County Circuit Court to issue preliminary and permanent injunctions stopping the defendants from “exercising creditor remedies� against them, including foreclosure and non-foreclosure sale of assets.

In addition to direct and punitive damages plus attorney fees, they also seek to stop what they claim to be the “purported sale� of their loans and a declaration that they are entitled to pay off the loans for up to the price at which they were “purportedly sold.�

TRT Holdings and Omni Hotels & Resorts did not respond to requests for comment.

Justices claim confidential information set up loans sale

The Justices claim in their new complaint they informed Carter Bank in the third quarter of 2025 that global investment bank First Investment Bank had identified lenders that would pay off loans on The Greenbrier.

The Justices claim Carter Bank reneged on a previous agreement that the loans on The Greenbrier could be paid off for approximately $300 million and instead raised their payoff demand to roughly $360 million, resulting in all but one of the prospective replacement lenders withdrawing from the lending process.

The remaining, unnamed prospective replacement lender withdrew in response to Carter Bank setting what the Justices call “an arbitrary deadline … that made the transaction effectively impossible� in their lawsuit.

The Justices accuse Carter Bank of intentionally leading The Greenbrier in 2026 to believe it would not sell the loans as long as there was progress in a sale process being administered by Second Investment Bank, another global investment banking provider that the Justices say they contacted to pursue a potential sale of minority interest in The Greenbrier.

Carter Bank had acknowledged the sale process would likely take at least nine to 12 months to finish, the Justices claim.

The Justices accuse TRT of buying the Justices’ loans via White Sulphur Springs Holdings at least in part because of confidential information it received under false pretenses.

The plaintiffs say that accusation stems from Blake Rowling and Smith visiting The Greenbrier in September 2024 under the pretense of serving as advisors to an unnamed private equity firm that funded another payoff proposal presented on March 18, 2026, by the Justices to Carter Bank.

TRT obtained access to confidential information belonging to The Greenbrier under a confidentiality agreement between Greenbrier Hotel Corp. and the private equity firm, with the accord providing that no one subject to its provisions could use any information obtained through it for any purpose other than the financing transaction being considered by the private equity firm, the Justices assert.

The Justices claim TRT’s true motive in obtaining their properties’ confidential information was to boost its effort to acquire The Greenbrier, including proprietary pricing, marketing and reservation information, confidential financial records and access to areas of The Greenbrier resort complex off limits to the public.

The Justices further claim that Carter Bank knew TRT was violating the confidentiality agreement by using confidential information in an attempt to acquire the loans.

Carter Bank spokesperson Brooks Taylor declined to comment on the complaint Monday, saying the bank has a policy not to comment on pending litigation.

Omni affiliate cited 'waste, fraud and abuse' among Justices 

As of Monday afternoon, court records showed no filing from the Justices in response to White Sulphur Springs Holdings’ receivership-seeking lawsuit.

White Sulphur Springs Holdings’ filing says the company seeks a receiver “due to the waste, fraud and abuse of� the defendants, which it says threaten the value of its collateral — The Greenbrier Resort.

White Sulphur Springs Holdings contends the defendants have been “diverting substantial amounts of revenue generated from The Greenbrier Resort to their other, unrelated businesses,� resulting in “significant unpaid taxes" for the resort, not making all required payments to resort employees — including employees’ health insurance premiums and 401(k) employer matching contributions — and the resort itself “not being properly operated and maintained.�

The complaint cites “considerable mounting legal and financial issues� facing the defendants and their affiliates, including:

• A November agreement Justice and his wife struck to pay $5.1 million in unpaid federal income tax assessments after the IRS sued the couple over what it said was an outstanding balance of $5,164,739 in unpaid federal income tax assessments for the 2009 tax year

• A December federal court filing from Louisiana-based First Guaranty Bank indicating the Justices’ Greenbrier Hotel Corp. owed a debt that had ballooned to more than $47 million and was growing by more than $20,000 a day, accruing from a loan the bank made to the company under a lending program established through the CARES Act

• Two Kentucky companies, New London Tobacco Market Inc. and Fivemile Energy LLC, presenting evidence to contend last month that Justice’s business empire has been hiding hundreds of millions of dollars in assets in a federal court case in which they have been trying for years to collect on an eight-figure judgment against Justice-controlled firms

• The Greenbrier Clinic failing to meet federal clinical image quality standards for mammograms, resulting in the suspension of all mammography operations at the facility and a federal class-action lawsuit filed last week

Before agreements ended them, public auctions of the Justice family’s Greenbrier Hotel had been scheduled for August and October 2024 in response to a loan default.

The West Virginia Tax Division issued three tax lien notices to the Greenbrier Hotel Corp. and Greenbrier Sporting Club Inc. that were filed with the Greenbrier County clerk in September 2025, indicating roughly $1.36 million in unremitted taxes.

The Greenbrier Sporting Club is a private equity club that offers memberships to those who buy real estate at The Greenbrier resort.

Some club members have disputed Justice family ownership interest in the club, saying they hold that interest instead.

Justice pledged that he would put his children in charge of his family’s business operations upon becoming West Virginia’s governor in 2017. Justice has suggested in interviews and court proceedings after he became governor that he remains familiar with his coal companies’ operations.

In an emailed statement on April 3, Greenbrier president Jill Justice confirmed that an affiliate of TRT Holdings, parent company of Omni, had acquired The Greenbrier’s loans from Carter Bank.

“As is well known, our relationship with Carter was a challenging one for many years. We have already been in communication with the new lender and look forward to more discussions with them soon,� Jill Justice said at the time.