Group wants probe of BP spill case

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 (UPI) -- An environmental group claims the U.S. Justice Department may have moved too quickly to close its prosecution of BP for an oil spill in Alaska.

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility urged the department's inspector general Monday to investigate the action, McClatchy Newspapers reported. BP pleaded guilty to a federal misdemeanor last year and paid a $20 million penalty for two spills at Prudhoe Bay, including one in 2006 that leaked more than 200,000 gallons of oil.

The group filed the complaint on behalf of Scott West, who headed the Environmental Protection Agency investigation of the spill. West has left the EPA and now works for the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

Jeff Ruch of the public employee group said there has been a pattern of "low-ball" settlements for corporate environmental crimes. He said BP, when it agreed to the settlement in the North Slope spill, also settled an explosion in Texas in 2005 that killed 15 people for $50 million and added another $303 million for price manipulation in the propane market.