U.S. Slams BP for “Gross Negligence” in Gulf Oil Spill

The 39-page brief came in response to a motion BP filed in August urging the court to approve an estimated $7.8 billion settlement it has reached with 125,000 individuals and businesses affected by the spill. The government wrote that it had not planned to issue a response, but was moved to do so by what it described as “plainly misleading representations” in the BP motion that could undermine plans to prove “gross negligence.”

The Justice Department said that BP’s “cherry-picked assertions of robust recovery” along the Gulf Coast ignore lingering signs of damage in the region, including the poor health of dolphins in Louisiana’s Barataria Bay, dead or dying deep-sea corals, and “heavy marsh oiling.”


[link to www.pbs.org]