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BP Buys Silence Of Expert Witnesses

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July 22, 2010

You might be familiar with the manner in which British Petroleum has been silencing potential witnesses to the extent of damage caused by the Deepwater Horizon disaster.  A typical example was recently discussed by Anne Macquarie of the Nevada Appeal:

I have a friend who has been working for the last month for a private contractor, doing wildlife inventories in areas affected by the oil spill.  I asked her if I could talk to her about what she saw down there and share it with Nevada Appeal readers.

She told me she’d been required to sign a confidentiality agreement.  She couldn’t talk to anyone about anything she did there.  I didn’t push her — times are tough and I sure didn’t want her to lose her job.

Anticipating criminal prosecution and a nearly infinite number of civil lawsuits, BP has begun a campaign of signing-up as many potential expert witnesses as can be found, not only to testify on BP’s behalf in the numerous proceedings – but, more importantly – to buy their silence.  Litigation attorneys often refer to this tactic as, “buying experts off the street”.   Precious little attention has been focused on this activity.  Dylan Ratigan has exposed it and CBS News briefly touched the subject.  Other than those instances, the mainstream media have not discussed this ploy – at least as of this writing.   Here’s some of what CBS had to say:

BP has been trying to hire marine scientists from universities around the Gulf Coast in an apparent move to bolster the company’s legal defense against anticipated lawsuits related to the Gulf oil spill, according to a report from The Press-Register in Mobile, Ala.

Scientists from Louisiana State University, Mississippi State University and Texas A&M have reportedly accepted BP’s offer, according to the paper.

The federal government is expected to file a massive Natural Resources Damage Assessment lawsuit against BP, and it’ll have to draw on large amounts of scientific research to build its case.

*   *   *

Robert Wiygul, an Ocean Springs lawyer who specializes in environmental law, said BP is in effect denying the government access to valuable information by hiring the scientists and adding them to its legal team.  “It also buys silence,” Wiygul told the Press-Register, “thanks to confidentiality clauses in the contracts.”

Scientists who sign the contract to work for BP will be subject to a strict confidentiality agreement.  They will be barred from publishing, sharing or even speaking about data they collected for at least three years.

George Crozier, director of the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, who was approached by BP, told the paper:  “It makes me feel like they were more interested in making sure we couldn’t testify against them than in having us testify for them.”

The original story for the Alabama Press Register was written by Ben Raines.  His article included this interesting aspect of his investigative work on the piece:

BP officials declined to answer the newspaper’s questions about the matter.  Among the questions:  how many scientists and universities have been approached, how many are under contract, how much will they be paid, and why the company imposed confidentiality restrictions on scientific data gathered on its behalf.

Coincidentally, CBS also provided us with the perspective of musician/performance artist Laurie Anderson on this subject.  She appeared on David Letterman’s Late Show on July 14 to perform a song entitled, “Only An Expert”.

On July 21, Bloomberg News televised an interview with Matthew Simmons, founder of the Ocean Energy Institute.  Among the subjects included in the conversation was the topic of BP’s confidentiality agreements.  If what Mr. Simmons said is correct, BP’s legal defense efforts will become futile once the public realizes “we have now killed the Gulf of Mexico”.  At least on that one point, the cretins at BP are probably not the only individuals who are hoping that Mr. Simmons is wrong.



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