BP will be appealing a federal judge’s finding that it acted with gross negligence for its 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Some legal experts say the oil company will have a tough time in the appellate process.
Lawyers for BP are putting together an appeal of the ruling US District Judge Carl Barbier issued that could cost the company $18 billion.
Tulane law school professor Martin Davies is an expert in maritime law. He says it could have been worse for BP if Barbier found the company liable for punitive damages for employee misconduct over the spill.
“Then he would have to go on in the third phase of the trial and work out how much to slug ‘em for punitive damages as well as civil penalties," Davies said. "I think they would not be at all happy about that. So that is a small victory for BP here.”
Davies says that overall, the ruling is the very thing BP has been fearing from the outset.
University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias says Barbier outlined his findings in great detail.
“BP I think will try to appeal everything it can," Tobias said. "But I’m not sure that it will be able to convince an appellate court that the judge was wrong, or that there was some kind of error in what he did.”
Barbier also found BP carries 67 percent liability for the disaster. He’s set to begin the third phase of the trial in January to determine how much oil spilled, and therefore how much BP will pay in Clean Water Act fines.
