BP wins fast review to halt spill payments

A federal court will soon review BP’s bid to block payments of claims tied to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill that aren’t directly linked to the disaster, Bloomberg reports.

{mosads}BP won expedited consideration on Thursday by U.S. Circuit Judge Edith Brown Clement in New Orleans. Spill victims were directed to respond to BP’s motion by Jan. 8.

The explosion of BP’s deep-water Macondo well in April 2010 left 11 people dead and spilled millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

After thousand of lawsuits were filed against BP for damages, the British oil giant began to fight back. BP launched major ad buys alleging many the claims detailing economic harm were false.

Bloomberg also reports on the criminal prosecution of a BP engineer who was convicted in December for tampering with evidence related to the BP oil spill.

On Thursday, Kurt Mix asked a judge to dismiss an obstruction of justice conviction, claiming jurors used information they overheard in a courthouse elevator.