Inupiat Eskimo Family vs BP (Anchorage, Barrow: lease, how much, attorneys)

[RedJacket]

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — BP PLC has closed a small portion of the Prudhoe Bay oil field following a judge's ruling that federal regulators didn't get approval from the land owners.

BP closes portion of Prudhoe Bay oil field over land rent dispute with Inupiat Eskimo family - latimes.com (http://www.latimes.com/business/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-ak-bp-prudhoe-bay,0,758157.story - broken link)

[DannyL]

Seems like this could be a ripe plum for a contract attorney.

This seems to be in Floyd's backyard, maybe he could tell us what the real "coffeeshop talk" is.

[DannyL]

North Slope oil lease dispute may net Alaska family $5 million


"The family of Andrew Oenga, an Alaska Native fisherman who died about 20 years ago, contended BP used the Oenga's 40-acre allotment -- a decades-old fish camp -- in violation of its lease agreement. The family also alleged that the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which was supposed to be helping Oenga who neither read nor spoke English, failed to protect his interests as required by law."

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by DannyL

Seems like this could be a ripe plum for a contract attorney.

This seems to be in Floyd's backyard, maybe he could tell us what the real "coffeeshop talk" is.

That particular news story was far less informative (and in a way that seems to bias most readers) than previous stories. It took a very false BP stance, to put it mildly.

The court ordered the shutdown of this very small little part of BP's operation...

In fact it is the second time the court has ordered BP to cease an illegal pumping operation from that land. This time it put a stop to wells that last month pumped 25,000 barrels. This and the previous shutdown stopped the operation that has produced just two billion dollars of oil illegally. Not very significant at all, of course.

The Oenga family in Barrow cannot afford flush toilets, even though they own the property from which BP can pump $2,000,000,000 worth of oil. That is the perspective needed to understand what has happened.

The original contract was signed after the BIA negotiated with Andrew Oenga (through an interpeter, because he did not speak English). Andrew had refused for years to allow oil companies access to his favorite place to hunt, but he had gotten old. He passed away shortly after the contract was signed. The contract was only to allow a road and a pipeline to cross the land.

The project the original contract was intended to support was never completed. Instead BP went back to the BIA and amended the contract to allow drilling from the property into one specific oil field. This was authorized by the BIA, not the Oenga family, and there was no change to the dollar amount paid to the family as a result. That was in 1993, and by the time the family realized what was happening... the statute of limitations prevented them from redress. Hence much of the illegal use by BP has been protected by the court on a technicality because while the BIA was not protecting the rights of the family it still was legally acting for them. (That is the story of the BIA. See Cobell vs The US.)

The contract was modified in 1995 and had a provision from that time on stating that the Oenga family was not allowed to contact BP in any way (in person, by mail, by telephone, etc). It also allowed BP to build a drill pad to access one specific oil field.

What BP actually did was bulldoze the entire homesite, including all existing structures; they built a large drill pad and drilled into not just the specified field but into others, and allowed two other oil companies to illegally trespass and also pump oil through the facility. For this, the rent paid to the Oenga family was the same as it had been on a contract for a road and pipeline right of way that might use up to 1/4th of the allotment's 40 acres.

When the Oenga family discovered what had happened on their land (which they could no longer legally access), they tried to get the BIA too adjust the contract to reflect the difference. The BIA and BP would not change it. They finally took it to court. All of the above cited activity was uncovered as part of the discovery prior to the trial. BP of course tried to cover it up. They got caught, and at one point the judge even had the court visit the site. And that was when the pumping operation that was just shutdown became known, in 2008! BP had kept it hidden from the court for 3 years, and from the family for over a decade.

The above is not a case of what is alleged by the Oenga family to have happened... it is what a jury and a judge have decide are the valid facts of the case. It went to trial last summer, and BP lost. The current stir has only to do with deciding what reasonable damages and rent should actually be. The guilt of BP has already been decided.

Here is the last judgment that was issued (there were two prior judgments):

http://turtletalk.files.wordpress.co...ted-states.pdf

This legal battle has pitted a relatively poor family and one gracious attorney (Ray Givens of Bellvue WN has single handed fought the entire case from the start, without pay) against not just BP but the Department of the Interior... both of which have spend many hundreds of thousands, if not millions, to shield BP from justice.

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by DannyL

North Slope oil lease dispute may net Alaska family $5 million


"The family of Andrew Oenga, an Alaska Native fisherman who died about 20 years ago, contended BP used the Oenga's 40-acre allotment -- a decades-old fish camp -- in violation of its lease agreement. The family also alleged that the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which was supposed to be helping Oenga who neither read nor spoke English, failed to protect his interests as required by law."

Note that in addition to the above things "alleged", the court ruled that those are matters of fact, and that the real question at this point is not if BP owes the Oenga family money, but how much it owes them.

Don't hold your breath waiting for a check to be issued. I'd expect that just as with the Exxon Valdez damages, most of the people who are owed money in this case will die before BP pays anyone other than their attorneys a single penny.

[Ketabcha]

OMG!

I guess I am naive but I really did not realize that things of this magnitude were still happening on US soil.

I'm not a violent person but I would have been tempted to blow those well pads, etc, to morbid.

I also would have been angrier at BP for the stunt they pulled in the Gulf Coast had I known that they were such outrageous low lifes.

My thoughts are "Why are we protecting things overseas and not protecting our own people?" I am in no way an isolationist but when we spill our blood for people overseas while not noticing that our own folks are in dire need of protection then I tend to want to shore up our own concerns for our own people.

This is simply outrageous and leads me to believe that the BIA functions much like it did in its early days. Few really cared about Native Americans and their treatment reflected it.

There is a special place in hell for people who cheat and mistreat people who cannot defend themselves.

But at least the courts have sprung into action on the side of right.

I'm going to want to delete this post in about an hour because I am writing it in total anger which is not a good thing to do but it sure makes me feel better.

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by Ketabcha

OMG!

I guess I am naive but I really did not realize that things of this magnitude were still happening on US soil.

BP has been convicted of criminal charges, and has paid millions of dollars in fines in Alaska. But they make more money that way, so they continue...

The BIA has never changed. When Cobell brought suit against the Department of the Interior, the BIA destroyed documentation rather than provide it during discovery. The federal judge cited the Secretary of the Interior and the Undersecretary in charge of the BIA more than once for contempt of court!

Of course when it did get settled it wasn't for peanuts... it was for the peanut shells.

The "still happening" extends far and wide. In the late 1940's one judge wrote a memo about a case involving Seattle fish trap operators in SE Alaska, basically saying that the Tlingit Indians were on good legal ground, but it was too much of a victory to give Indians, so he was ruling against them.

Think that can't happen today? See the Venetie decision from the US Supreme Court, which essentially is the same.

Also look at how the US agreed to provide health care to Native Americans by treaty, and agreed to provide health care to Native Alaskans in an Act of Congress, all in trade for lands ceded to the US. The US has the land... but the Indian Health Care system has been funded at 60% of need for the last 15 years or so...

And BP had to shutdown that little itty bit of their operation, worth only a mere $2,000,000,000, because they won't pay the Oenga family enough to provide them with flush toilets in Barrow.

[DannyL]

Floyd, thanks for putting more light on the subject. I was aware of the family's living condition, and when I read the word "BIA" in the article I immediately thought "Oh SH**, there is more to this than is published".

[Ketabcha]

I simply have to ask "What is the Alaska State Government doing about this?" I bet dollars to doughnuts that this particular Inupiat family is not the only one being treated like they don't matter. Texas would be screaming bloody murder if something of this magnitude occurred down here. Of course, we're usually screaming about something but this would be so totally unacceptable that the South would rise again (when it should have never risen in the first place, IMO) and everyone in this country would hear about it. We can be really loud.

[arctichomesteader]

This whole thing is disgusting.