The Department of Justice has filed new claims against BP, accusing the company of “gross negligence and willful misconduct” with regard to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.
Trials are slated to begin in January, and The Atlantic Wire contends that the DOJ filing is “designed to undermine their (BP’s) standing in court.”
Asking the court not to comment on BP’s claims, Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange added that the company wasted time—during which many more barrels of oil spilled into the Gulf—by trying to stop the spill with methods they knew wouldn’t work.
If the court finds BP guilty of “gross negligence, ” fines would be quadrupled with a potential liability of $21 billion, The Atlantic Wire said.
By Nedra Bloom
