Judge OKs $4B BP oil spill criminal settlement; BP to plead guilty to manslaughter

[Dustlawyer]

8. BP exerted influence (bribed or threatened or blackmailed) over every aspect of

The disaster and subsequent claims process. No Repug governor of a coastal state came to demand BP take care of their citizen victims. Ken Feinberg, the NY attorney appointed the "Independant head of the Gulf Coast Claims Facility" (hand picked by BP) was found to not be Independant and for all relevant times, was BP's representative by Judge Barbier. None of the decision makers at the top were ever charged, and now they are shoving a B.S. class settlement down our throats where you had to decide whether to opt in or out of the class before you knew what your offer, if anything would be. By opting in the class (you had only to do nothing if you wanted in, opt out had to be in writing, signed by the claimant, not the attorney for claimant, which automatically waived your right to trial against BP. The Court and class administrator then sent letters to represented claimants who opted out, w/o telling their attorneys, and explained they had extended the opt back in deadline and the claimant only had to check a box and mail it back in. All of this behind the claimant's attorneys back. They will not even tell the attorney which clients opted back into the class. BP is as dirty a corporation as a corporation can be. Fuck BP!