Several environmental groups have asked a federal appeals court to disqualify a judge from a lawsuit over the Obama administration's initial six-month moratorium on deep-water oil drilling.

U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman overturned the temporary drilling ban in June and refused last month to withdraw from the case.

In a court filing Thursday, environmental groups supporting the moratorium asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to remove Feldman from the case because of his investments in several oil and gas companies. Feldman says he learned he owned Exxon Mobil stock a day before he ruled and sold it several hours before he issued the decision.

Last month, a 5th Circuit panel rejected the government's bid to restore its six-month ban on issuing new permits for deep-water drilling and suspension of 33 existing drilling projects in the Gulf of Mexico.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.

In the immediate aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, BP publicly touted its expert oil clean-up response, but it quietly girded for a legal fight that could soon embroil hundreds of attorneys, span five states and last more than a decade.

BP swiftly signed up experts who otherwise would work for plaintiffs. It shopped for top-notch legal teams. It presented volunteers, fishermen and potential workers with waivers, hoping they would sign away some of their right to sue.

Recently, BP announced it would create a $20 billion victim-assistance fund, which could reduce court challenges.

Robert J. McKee, an attorney with the Fort Lauderdale, Fla., firm of Krupnick Campbell Malone, was surprised by how quickly BP hired scientists and laboratories specializing in the collection and analysis of air, sea, marsh and beach samples - evidence that's crucial to proving damages in pollution cases.

Five days after the April 20 blowout, McKee said, he tried to hire a scientist who's assisted him in an ongoing 16-year environmental lawsuit in Ecuador involving Dupont.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.

BP PLC said Monday that it will pay for all the cleanup costs from a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that could continue spewing crude for at least another week.

The company posted a fact sheet on its Web site saying it took responsibility for the response to the Deepwater Horizon spill and would pay compensation for legitimate claims for property damage, personal injury and commercial losses.

"We are responsible, not for the accident, but we are responsible for the oil and for dealing with it and cleaning the situation up," chief executive Tony Hayward said Monday on ABC's "Good Morning America." He said the equipment that failed on the rig and led to the spill belonged to owner Transocean Ltd., not BP, which operated the rig.

Meanwhile, Hayward said chemical dispersants seem to be having a significant impact keeping oil from flowing to the surface, though he did not elaborate.

The update on the dispersants came as BP was preparing a system never tried nearly a mile under water to siphon away the geyser of crude from a blown-out well a mile underwater. However, the plan to lower 74-ton, concrete-and-metal boxes being built to capture the oil and siphon it to a barge waiting at the surface will need at least another six to eight days to get it in place.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.

Thomas McFarland had unsuccessfully sought to enter a pretrial intervention program that would have spared him a criminal record.

Under terms of a plea agreement, the state will recommend the 61-year-old be sentenced to one year of probation and be ordered to pay the seaside town of Avalon $100,000 to offset cleanup costs.

McFarland admitted dumping hypodermic needles, cotton swabs and other medical waste into an inlet just before Labor Day weekend in 2008.

His lawyer says the dentist was distraught to the point of mental illness over his wife's lung cancer, and appeared to be acting out in "a cry for help."

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.