BP oil spill presents host of legal issues

VENICE, La., June 1 (UPI) -- The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is triggering an "unbelievable array" of legal issues for courts to consider, lawyers and legal experts say.

Hundreds of spill victims are testing the 1990 Oil Pollution Act -- the result of the Exxon Valdez tanker spill in Alaska 21 years ago -- and maritime law, prompting attorneys to question how far protections extend and how long victims must wait to receive compensation, USA Today reported.

"There are an unbelievable array of issues in this case," said Stanford law professor Jeffrey Fisher, who argued the Exxon Valdez case for commercial fishermen and Alaska businesses before the U.S. Supreme Court. "One of the most painful things about the Exxon case was that it took us 20 years to get the case finished and get the money in the pockets of the victims. One can't help but wonder if the same thing is going to happen here."

Transocean, which owns the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig that exploded April 20 and sank two days later, already has asked a judge to limit claims against it to $27 million under an 1851 maritime law limiting liability. As a result, a judge suspended more than 100 claims against Transocean, which leased the rig to BP, until the issue is decided.

Stuart Smith, an environmental attorney in New Orleans, is working with 12 other law firms to sue BP on behalf of Gulf Coast commercial fishermen and other businesses on public nuisance grounds.

"Maritime law back then was meant to protect shipowners. Like oil companies today, they had all the money and all the power," Smith told USA Today. "The Valdez situation resulted in what Congress obviously felt was an injustice."

The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 requires the company the U.S. Coast Guard says is responsible for a spill to pay as much as $1 billion to clean it and repair natural resource damage and as much as $75 million to compensate victims for lost income, USA Today said.

BP and its contractors could pay more than that if the federal government's investigation finds negligence, deliberate misconduct or violations of federal regulations. The federal government also could file criminal charges based on several federal environment-related laws, Fisher says.