Already battling to cap the gushing oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico, BP is also facing a war on another front: Thousands of economic victims of the disaster filing complaints against the energy giant.
Some 180 class action lawsuits have been lodged so far in at least six federal courts in Gulf Coast states — with legal analysts estimating BP will eventually face billions of dollars in fines.
“Virtually anybody along the Gulf Coast is going to be affected in some way by this tragedy,” New Orleans lawyer Daniel Becnel told reporters, adding he was already handling thousands of victims and receiving requests to handle some 200 cases each business hour.
The complaints seek compensation for BP’s negligence as leaser of the Deepwater Horizon rig, which exploded on April 20 before sinking two days later and prompting the worst manmade environmental disaster in US history.
Other companies may also be in the firing line for legal reprieve: Transocean owned the drilling platform, Halliburton was in charge of cementing the pipeline seal and Cameron International made the all-important blowout preventer valve that failed to shut off the leak.
So far, those who have filed for economic damages include fishermen, shrimpers, oyster catchers, boaters restaurant owners and seafood sellers — part of the tourism and fishing industries that have suffered the most because of the spill.
The disaster is also likely to hit other sectors, including shareholders of BP and Halliburton, whose stock value has plunged since the leak began, Becnel said.
National parks, whose ecosystems have been destroyed by the spill, oil rig workers on other platforms, whose work have been curtailed or cut off completely, and even consumers who experienced a sharp hike in seafood prices are also likely to file.
For Jeffrey Fisher, a Stanford University professor who represented Alaskans following the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill, one thing is certain: “It’s impossible to predict” how long it will last.
“The trial judge in the Exxon Valdez case did a masterful job and that case took five years from spill to trial on the main issues,” he recalled. “It took 16 more years in subsequent appeals, which was the real tragedy.”
“But the reality is that these kinds of cases raise a dizzying array of legal issues and can take an extremely long time to resolve if the two sides can’t agree,” Fisher added.
While BP has previously agreed to US government demands that it pay all costs related to the Gulf spill, from the cleanup to “legitimate” economic claims, the company has already begun to polish its legal arguments.
It has even sought to move the proceedings away from the worst hit parts of the Gulf to Houston, home to major oil and gas companies.
The Texas city is “very oil and gas friendly, that’s why they want to go there. They think people are going to be on their side,” Becnel said.
Plaintiffs are fighting to keep the battle in New Orleans, but Becnel noted another serious problem: The sheer number of people affected in the area means that judges would likely have to recuse themselves because of a conflict of interest.
With only 12 federal judges practicing in New Orleans, “you would have to make sure that the thousands, or tens of thousands, of people who make suits are not related,” he said, noting that if a brother-in-law of one of the judges filed a claim, the judge in question could not handle the case.
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