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BP Accuses Halliburton of Destroying Evidence in Oil-Spill Case

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BPBP Plc (ADR) (NYSE: BP) has alleged that oil services firm Halliburton Co. (NYSE: HAL) destroyed evidence in the weeks after the Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010. BP said that evidence destroyed by Halliburton showed that the cement formula it used on the drilling operation was flawed.

BP made the claims in a federal civil-court filing in New Orleans today. BP and Halliburton have continued to blame each other for the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that killed 11 people. The oil spill was the largest in the U.S. history and hurt BP’s reputation severely. Both, BP and Halliburton face potentially huge civil and criminal penalties relating the accident.


Halliburton has rejected BP’s claims that the cement formula used for drilling operation was flawed. The company has said in the past that the mix it recommended to BP was stable and that the well failed due to poor engineering and design choices made by BP.

BP has countered Halliburton’s arguments, saying that Halliburton conducted tests after the accident that showed that the same cement formula used on the Deepwater Horizon well did have problems. A spokeswoman for Halliburton today said that the claims made BP in the civil-court were without merit and the company looks forward to contesting their motion in court.

BP has said in its filing that a technician working at Halliburton’s Duncan, Oklahoma research lab recreated the cement formula after the oil spill and found it to be thin and not suitable for the job. Halliburton also created a computerized model of the well cement job and found no problems with the well design, BP said in the civil-court filing.

BP has alleged that Halliburton did not provide records of the tests during the legal discovery process and later informed BP officials that data collected and used in testing was thrown out.

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edliston
Post Written By: Ed Liston

Ed Liston is a senior contributing editor at TheStockMarketWatch.com. An active market watcher and investor, Ed guides an independent team of experienced analysts and writes for multiple stock trader publications. He is widely quoted in various financial publications on the Internet. When Ed is not writing about stocks, investing in stocks, talking about stocks, or otherwise doing something stock related, he likes to go sailing and fishing in his yacht.


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Ed Liston

Ed Liston is a senior contributing editor at TheStockMarketWatch.com. An active market watcher and investor, Ed guides an independent team of experienced analysts and writes for multiple stock trader publications. He is widely quoted in various financial publications on the Internet. When Ed is not writing about stocks, investing in stocks, talking about stocks, or otherwise doing something stock related, he likes to go sailing and fishing.

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