Even if evidence in the trial establishes new sources of pollution or phony asset transfers, that won't help, says Matthew Garretson, whose Garretson Resolution Group oversees the trust for tort claims. "The die is already cast," he says. He declined to say whether lawsuits such as Jamison's meet the requirements.
Thousands of other people who say Kerr-McGee caused their injuries are already out of luck. Some missed deadlines, didn't follow legal procedures or couldn't afford medical tests to link their illnesses to alleged toxins. Many settled for pittances because they were sick, needed money or were afraid they'd die before heading to court.
Bankruptcy made things worse, because the cost to bring suits isn't worthwhile unless there can be a recovery, says Robert Rabin, a law professor at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, who specializes in tort law.
The government case against Anadarko seeks to prove that Kerr-McGee carried out a sham transfer with the intent of escaping a toxic past and placing oil and gas assets beyond the reach of potential claimants.
The U.S. says Kerr-McGee never revealed the extent of its polluting properties and had internally referred to at least 11 locations where it treated wood as "secret sites."
'Secret Sites'
The sites, along with hundreds of other polluted properties, were hidden even from most Kerr-McGee employees and not discovered until after Tronox filed for bankruptcy, according to the lawsuit.
Because the toxic locations were "secret," an unknown number of people who may be suffering today would have had no way of tracing their ailments to Kerr-McGee, says John Hueston, who is overseeing legal strategy for the lawsuit.
"Kerr-McGee took steps to ensure that both the EPA and other potential claimants would not know or discover polluted sites in a timely fashion," says Hueston, who was a federal prosecutor in the trial of Enron Corp. executives Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling. "A challenge in the case will be the defense from Anadarko that many of these sites were unknown to it and Kerr-McGee."
Burnt Rubber