$100 Million Verdict for BP Contract Workers Sickened by Carbon Disulfide at Texas City Refinery
After trial: The verdict did not stand. In March 2010 Judge Hoyt set aside the $100 million in punitive damages, leaving about $326,000 in compensatory damages.
Won by The Buzbee Law Firm.
A Galveston federal jury awarded $100 million to ten contract workers exposed to carbon disulfide at BP's Texas City refinery in April 2007. The judge set aside the punitive damages, seven workers later settled on undisclosed terms, and the Fifth Circuit vacated the verdict for the remaining three in 2011.
What happened
In April 2007, ten contract workers were exposed to carbon disulfide while performing repair and maintenance work at BP's Texas City refinery, located roughly 30 miles southeast of Houston. Carbon disulfide is a toxic, colorless liquid that attacks the nervous system; even short-term exposure can cause headaches, dizziness, and long-term neurological damage. The workers, part of a larger group of 143 represented by Houston attorney Tony Buzbee, alleged that BP knew the chemical was present and failed to provide adequate protection or warning.
After a three-week trial in Galveston federal court, the jury deliberated for just one and a half days before returning a verdict on December 18, 2009.
The jury awarded each of the ten plaintiffs $10 million in punitive damages, bringing the total to just over $100 million. Nine of the workers also received between $5,000 and $10,000 in compensatory damages for pain, suffering, and medical costs. The tenth worker received more than $240,000 in compensatory relief. In total, the verdict exceeded $100 million. BP called the result 'utterly unjustified, improper and unsupportable' and announced it would appeal.
In March 2010, U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt vacated the punitive damages. The judge found that while BP had been negligent in allowing the chemical release, the evidence did not clear the higher bar of gross negligence, which requires proof of an extreme risk of harm and a conscious disregard of that risk. Judge Hoyt pointed to the fact that BP maintained monitoring systems at the plant. That left a compensatory award of about $326,000 across all ten plaintiffs, and BP appealed even those remaining damages.
Seven of the ten workers then settled with BP on terms that were not disclosed. For the three who stayed in the case, the Fifth Circuit vacated the verdict in November 2011 and reversed the denial of BP's motion for judgment as a matter of law, holding that the jury had been wrongly instructed on res ipsa loquitur. No part of the verdict stood.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.ABC13 Houston: Jury Awards BP Workers $100 Million in Lawsuit (December 2009)·Archived copy
- 2.Insurance Journal: Texas Jury Awards BP Workers $100M in Lawsuit (December 2009)·Archived copy
- 3.Insurance Journal: Judge Sets Aside $100 Million Verdict in BP Texas Case (March 2010)·Archived copy
- 4.U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, 'Pearson v. BP Products North America, Inc., No. 10-40442 (unpublished)', Nov. 10, 2011
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