Facing claims and lawsuits from thousands of plaintiffs accusing the company of cheating them out of millions of dollars, Chesapeake Energy wants one judge to oversee the rapidly growing tangle of litigation alleging underpayment of royalties from its wells in the Barnett Shale. Attorneys representing the Oklahoma City energy giant last week asked a state judicial panel to consolidate the 100 or so cases already filed in Tarrant, Johnson and Dallas counties and send them to one court for crucial pretrial decisions on issues like evidence and testimony.