Last week's proposed final settlement of the main class action lawsuit stemming from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster at BP's Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico could pave the way for further settlements in other aspects of the case, one legal expert who has followed the case said Tuesday.
Tulane University law professor Edward Sherman, who reviewed last week's 1,000-plus-page filing by the two sides in the case -- BP and the Plantiffs Steering Committee -- said in an interview that, "I don't think there was anything new or startling in the filing last week, but there was an awful lot of detail."
Sherman, who specializes in complex litigation, calledd the Macondo case, "probably the largest and most complex piece of litigation in US history."
The final settlement agreement filed on April 18 with the federal court in New Orleans, Louisiana, "proposes a four-month opt-out period, and I think that if [US District Court Judge Carl Barbier] approves the deal as presented to him, you will see a very high percentage of opt ins. There may be a few opt outs. There are some businesses with big claims, and some disgruntled individual attorneys who thought that sweetheart deals were being made, but it would be such an enormous undertaking at that point."
Even if the final settlement gets 100% opt in by the class action plaintiffs, BP still faces civil and possibly criminal penalties from the federal government, as well as litigation that was not consolidated in the current case.
While the first criminal charges in connection with the Macondo spill were filed Tuesday (See story, 1919 GMT), that action was separate from possible criminal charges against the company for the blowout and spill on April 20, 2010.
