The oil barons may be held accountable after all. A year and a half after the BP oil spill murdered 11 men and spewed 5 million barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico – the Wall Street Journal is reporting that U.S. Prosecutors are readying the first criminal charges against BP. The Department of Justice is allegedly looking into charging engineers and at least one supervisor with providing false information to regulators – a felony charge that could carry with it one to five years in prison. While this is a good first step – it won't even effect the executives of an oil corporation that, from the top down, didn’t give a damn about the lives of its workers or the environment. Following an oil spill last month in Brazil – Brazilian prosecutors are going after the President of Chevron – charging him with crimes that could lead to jail time and banning Chevron from the country. We need to do the same things here with BP: throw some suits in jail for murder and ban BP from ever doing business again in the United States.
"Renaissance Thinking About the Issues of Our Day"
Comments
BP leads the U.S. refining industry in deaths over the last decade, with 22 fatalities since 1995 — more than a quarter of those killed in refineries nationwide.... The company's total includes 15 contractors who died in the March 23 Texas City accident, as well as those who died in seven other fatal accidents, including one just last week in Washington state. More than 10 times as many people have died in BP refineries as in those owned by Exxon Mobil Corp., considered the company's major U.S.-based peer.
http://www.chron.com/news/article/BP-leads-the-nation-in-refinery-deaths-Chronicle-1579831.php#endLoop
The oil barons may be held accountable after all.
And that would be after Hell freezes over. You will have to wait for Jesus to see things go that way. This is the Royals, you know, and we love them because they are like everyone else, and they have always had our best interests in their vault.
C-span had a congressman [TX?] apologizing to BP for holding them accountable.
C-span had a congressman [TX?] apologizing to BP for holding them accountable.
Maybe Burton from Okieland or maybe it's Texas?
it won't even effect the executives of an oil corporation that, from the top down, didn’t give a damn about the lives of its workers or the environment.
Is there enough data to make that assumption? Is it proven that the excutives took any unusual safety risks? Did they okay any short cuts or illegal behaviour? I need real info before I can climb on that band wagon. If they did indeed willfully risk the lives of their employees then they should pay. But operational and safety decisions on the rig are probably made by the folks on the rig. Why? Because the execs are not the experts in this area. The engineers and technicians are. It is highly possible that all of the decisions that led to the accident were made on the rig. I guarantee that the rig had a safety leader and a safety team on board who were tasked with reviewing procedures and preventing injuries. Those are the guys I want to hear from. Were they told to cut corners? We will have to wait and see.
Innocent until proven guilty.
That is the sole reason why you used may be to describe them. I mean, they are so good at it that it already seems that they have already planned their way out and when you are going up against an enormous entity, you are surely going in for a treat.
There are really a ton of accidents they can be held accounted for though there are just a few who make it out to the media.
The problem is that we don't know if any laws were violated. Or if any execs were involved. Shortcuts can be taken without upper management knowledge. It happens all the time.
Maybe it happened here,maybe it didn't. I'm sure nobody in the oil business wants to take the rap for an exec. I guess we'll have to wait for all the facts.
Had you been paying any attention to the oil industry's 'safety concerns' and practices, you would not raise questions about the facts. They cut corners all the time when profits are threatened. BP did not have the safety equipment it promised to have on the scene for the Exxon Valdez, so the trained workers could not do what they would have done to prevent that disaster. The same happened in the Gulf where they dicked around for a long time trying to figure out how to do what they had promised they were fully able to do. Then there is Halliburton. They make a practice of not being responsible because they beat it out of court by corruption. If you have not followed the issues, please do not show up at the last minute questioning informed posts.
It was thoroughly covered at the beginning of the story that BP executives pushed the rig engineers to deadlines for which they weren't ready.
It was thoroughly covered that BP executives forced their bottom line, ignoring permits and inspections, all covered by federal law.
The Army Corps of Engineers would have had to approve a number of permits. The file is public. So far, their mistakes have been numerous on the side of industry.
In the Public Records is a Permit File of the Department of Environmental Protection or Water Resources which should contain every application for every required permit stamped "approved." This is why we enacted Federal Wetlands Protection.
Anyone who can afford to go to the Department in person and get the file copied should. Things have probably been altered in the file by now which will need scrutinizing by an expert, for fraud.
I have worked with much smaller environmental impacters than BP, and in my county, the Commissioners are on the side of money. The Environmerntal Department does what the Commissioners say. Some guys get instant permits and others get raked over the coals till they waste their capital on lawyers to fight the unwinnable fight against The Department.
Not only should executives be held responsible, but so should our civil servants who STAMPED PERMITS- any sudden changes in their net worth? The environmental case worker for BP's file has a requirement to make sure the company has all their permits and inspections in place. That is the Law.
But, money talks and Walkers walk.
I think using the term "murder" is over the top. Involuntary manslaughter is more like it. It's a high risk occupation and the workers know that going in. However if every precaution and safety measure wasn't adhered to due to "costs" then somebody needs to be held accountable. That has to be at the top and not conveniently placed on the shoulders of a middleman scapegoat which is often the case. Unfortunately if there are consequences it will probably be paid in the form of a "fine" instead of jailtime as is usually the case when it comes to the rich elite.
Do we have any evidence that anyone sitting in an office hundreds of miles away was negligent or criminal? If they were, then why would the feds want to let them off the hook? I don't think that The Obama adminstration has any love for big oil. Maybe they simply cannot find a crime to charge them with.
Greg Palast has documented a long history of evasion and irresponsibility in the oil industry, particularly with BP, the real villain in the Exxon Valdez disaster where the safety equipment to be used by the trained workers was not put where it was promised, among other 'lapses.' Business simply assumes that fines will be less than the cost of doing it right, and they don't pay the externalities of these disasters, we do.
rigel, you really need to do some study before you act as if the charges are baseless and the guilty are really innocent. The list of ugly crimes just about everywhere oil is pumped is too gross to ignore and easy to find if you really cared. But, if you are here to learn, check out Greg Palast's work and get an education.
rigel, you really need to do some study before you act as if the charges are baseless and the guilty are really innocent. The list of ugly crimes just about everywhere oil is pumped is too gross to ignore and easy to find if you really cared. But, if you are here to learn, check out Greg Palast's work and get an education.
Do you have any specific examples? Who commit a crime? What was his name? And what law did he violate? That's the problem. We only have general accusations. For a case to be prosecuted, you need specifics. I'm not going to claim that anything is baseless. We simply need more info.
The Niger basin, the Amazon interior, Louisiana, Texas, everywhere they get the oil the people who live there get cancer or genocide.
The Niger basin, the Amazon interior, Louisiana, Texas, everywhere they get the oil the people who live there get cancer or genocide.
Not an answer. You need to connect the dots. Connect the people to the "crime." Who commited genocide? And where is the evidence that he targeted people for death. You cannot put a phantom in prison. Who are you accusing?
If you refuse to know anything, the dots will never connect. Business decisions get made, people die and their land is polluted. Goons are hired to enforce it, and people are killed in places around the world. Chevron is guilty of genocide in the Amazon and Nigeria. If you close your eyes and stick plugs in your ears, you might not see or hear. If you want to know, go find out because you will find the shocking truth in lots of places. It is your responsibility to learn, not mine to be your teacher. Prove me wrong, but you cannot. Read what Greg Palast has to say in lots of places.
Chevron is guilty of genocide in the Amazon and Nigeria.
Everybody in Chevron? The geologist searching for oil? The maintenance man at the refinery. The shift leaders secretary? Who did they kill? Accusations are fine but will get you nowhere without evidence and a name. Who gets charged, what is the crime and what connection does he have to the "crime." Simply screaming genocide is pissing in the wind. Until my questions are answered you got nothin.
Do you have any specific examples? Who commit a crime? What was his name? And what law did he violate? That's the problem. We only have general accusations. For a case to be prosecuted, you need specifics. I'm not going to claim that anything is baseless. We simply need more info.
OK.
In one case, BP's CEO of Alaskan operations hired a former CIA expert to break into the home of a whistleblower, Chuck Hamel, who had complained of conditions at the pipe's tanker facility. BP tapped his phone calls with a US congressman and ran a surveillance and smear campaign against him. When caught, a US federal judge said BP's acts were "reminiscent of Nazi Germany."
This was not an isolated case. Captain James Woodle, once in charge of the pipe's Valdez terminus, was blackmailed into resigning the post when he complained of disastrous conditions there. The weapon used on Woodle was a file of faked evidence of marital infidelity. Nice guys, eh?
Two decades ago, I had the unhappy job of leading an investigation of British Petroleum's management of the Alaska pipeline system. I was working for the Chugach villages, the Alaskan Natives who own the shoreline slimed by the 1989 Exxon Valdez tanker grounding.
Even then, a courageous, steel-eyed government inspector, Dan Lawn, was hollering about corrosion all through the BP pipeline. I say "courageous" because Lawn kept his job only because his union's lawyers have kept BP from having his head.
It wasn't until 2006, 17 years later, that BP claimed to have suddenly discovered corrosion necessitating an emergency shut-down of the line.
It was pretty darn hard for BP to claim surprise in August 2006 that corrosion required shutting the pipeline. Five months earlier, Inspector Lawn had written his umpteenth warning when he identified corrosion as the cause of a big leak.
That's just an excerpt I found rather quickly. There's plenty more. Read here. That's not even getting into the Gulf spill. But there are similar stories about that. If you really are interested, and are not just here to argue for argument's sake, then you will go find it yourself. I am not your personal Google™.
I think there were some good young patriots of sincere religious belief who served their Fuhrer in the SS. Would you give them a pass for Hitler?
Chevron employs lots of people who take their paychecks for doing what could be decent work; but the corporation engages in criminal activity and the record of its intrusions into many areas of the world are properly called genocidal. rigel, get your sense of integrity together and do your own research. We are not here to be your tutors and reference guides. Blow this stuff up your own arse.
Do you have any specific examples? Who commit a crime? What was his name? And what law did he violate? That's the problem. We only have general accusations. For a case to be prosecuted, you need specifics. I'm not going to claim that anything is baseless. We simply need more info.
OK.
In one case, BP's CEO of Alaskan operations hired a former CIA expert to break into the home of a whistleblower, Chuck Hamel, who had complained of conditions at the pipe's tanker facility. BP tapped his phone calls with a US congressman and ran a surveillance and smear campaign against him. When caught, a US federal judge said BP's acts were "reminiscent of Nazi Germany."
This was not an isolated case. Captain James Woodle, once in charge of the pipe's Valdez terminus, was blackmailed into resigning the post when he complained of disastrous conditions there. The weapon used on Woodle was a file of faked evidence of marital infidelity. Nice guys, eh?
Two decades ago, I had the unhappy job of leading an investigation of British Petroleum's management of the Alaska pipeline system. I was working for the Chugach villages, the Alaskan Natives who own the shoreline slimed by the 1989 Exxon Valdez tanker grounding.
Even then, a courageous, steel-eyed government inspector, Dan Lawn, was hollering about corrosion all through the BP pipeline. I say "courageous" because Lawn kept his job only because his union's lawyers have kept BP from having his head.
It wasn't until 2006, 17 years later, that BP claimed to have suddenly discovered corrosion necessitating an emergency shut-down of the line.
It was pretty darn hard for BP to claim surprise in August 2006 that corrosion required shutting the pipeline. Five months earlier, Inspector Lawn had written his umpteenth warning when he identified corrosion as the cause of a big leak.
That's just an excerpt I found rather quickly. There's plenty more. Read here. That's not even getting into the Gulf spill. But there are similar stories about that. If you really are interested, and are not just here to argue for argument's sake, then you will go find it yourself. I am not your personal Google™.
That's exactly the type of info I was looking for. But it is not relevant to the Gulf spill. You cannot use past crimes as evidence in a current case. If you want someone to be hung for murder, you need to ID the murderer and prove that he commited the crime. Who gets charged for the Gulf and what is the criminal evidence? You will have a hard time finding someone who loves nature more than me. If shortcuts were taken that killed people and wildlife as Thom suggested. I want them to pay. But you cannot assume that the crime was okayed by the "oil barons." This was probably done by those on the rig.
It sets a pattern of behavior, and when you look into the decisions regarding "Deepwater," you find the same lack of real attention to safety, cost-cutting and failed promises of technology up to the task. If the people on the rig were pushing to get the oil without taking the kind of care practiced by the Norwegians and Brazilians, you can draw the conclusions that there is a corporate culture that puts profits over responsibiliity for the environment and the safety of workers.
It sets a pattern of behavior, and when you look into the decisions regarding "Deepwater," you find the same lack of real attention to safety, cost-cutting and failed promises of technology up to the task. If the people on the rig were pushing to get the oil without taking the kind of care practiced by the Norwegians and Brazilians, you can draw the conclusions that there is a corporate culture that puts profits over responsibiliity for the environment and the safety of workers.
Well, I'm with you. We need to get to the bottom of it. We need to know what the findings are and how they were reached. "Total transparency." I'm guessing that if lower level employess are scape goated, they will sing like parrots. They are not going to take the fall for someone else. I wouldn't.
They need their jobs. It really is pathetic what happens to whistleblowers or anyone who bucks the culture of greed first. It is 'fiduciary responsibility,' or no real responsibility at all, just a license to close the eyes to everything but the stripped down bottom line. Study and learn. You will be shocked at how evil this stuff is. Removing the decision makers from human contact with the victims or the damage is how this is done. NPR had a book about people who saved Jews despite orders from on high to keep them out of Switzerland, etc. The point was those who had to look the victims in the eye saw their suffering and were much less likely to follow orders than those in offices issuing the orders. Knowing the results of the orders is not the same as seeing the people.
It is not true for everyone, as we sadly know. But a lot fewer of us are willing to walk on by or be the one to order someone to death in person.