GCCF News

7/25/11 Gulf Coast Claims Facility to Face Audit
An independent audit will be performed on the $20 billion fund set up to compensate victims of last year’s BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Attorney General Eric Holder said.

In a letter to the fund’s administrator, Kenneth Feinberg, Holder stressed that the goal is to balance the need for resolving claims quickly and fairly along with the need to start an audit before the end of the year. more

7/15/2011 Oil Continues to Wash Ashore
Crude oil continues to wash ashore along the Gulf of Mexico coast a year after BP Plc (BP/) stopped the flow from its damaged Macondo well, which caused the worst U.S. offshore spill, government officials said.

About 491 miles (790 kilometers) of coastline in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida were contaminated by BP oil as of July 9, the last available tally from field inspections, Tim Zink, a spokesman for the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration, said in an e-mailed message. A total of 1,074 miles has been oiled since the spill began, he said. more

Recent BP Claims and GCCF Claims Developments
Breaking News
Updated 3/11/11

GCCF Czar says BP Claims lack Documentation
Kenneth Feinberg, the lawyer who is serving as the administrator of BP’s $20-billion oil spill claims fund, says a “huge number” of claimants are failing to provide basic documents such as tax returns and financial statements, which are necessary to prove the extent of their losses. story

Feinberg was recently ruled as not being independent.
U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier said BP claims czar Ken Feinberg must clearly
disclose in all communications that he is acting for and on behalf of BP. story

BP Claims Process Adversarial
according to Byron Stier, a professor of mass tort litigation at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles. “It’s much more one of haggling and negotiation than of processing paperwork and tendering contracts,” Stier said. “It’s now clear that claimants need counsel to determine if the fund is the right path for them.”story

BP is using a Delay, Deny, Defend Strategy
This strategy, is commonly used by  insurance companies, is as follows: Delay payment, starve the claimant, and then offer the economically and emotionally stressed claimant a miniscule percent of all damages to which the claimant is entitled. story