Senators Call on AG DOJ to Investigate Transocean Ltd. Money Transfers

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Source: Senate Press Release

Senators Call on AG DOJ to Investigate Transocean Ltd. Money Transfers

Owner of Destroyed Oil Rig in Gulf of Mexico to Move $1 Billion out of Company Accounts – Action Could Limit Company’s Liability

Monday, May 24, 2010

Washington, D.C. – After reports that Transocean Ltd., the owner of the destroyed oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, intends to distribute $1 billion to private shareholders, U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wrote a letter with 17 of his Senate colleagues to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder asking that the Department of Justice look into the corporation’s financial transactions. The announcement came only hours after a closed-door meeting of company executives and weeks after the Transocean-owned Deepwater Horizon oil rig was destroyed, pumping massive amounts of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Senators Pat Leahy (D-Vt.), Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Mark Begich (D-Alaska), Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), Mark Udall (D-Colo.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Max Baucus (D-Mont.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Michael Bennet (D. Colo.), Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) and Robert Casey (D-Penn.) joined Wyden as co-signers.

In the letter, the Senators argued that the move by Transocean could further enhance the company’s protection from lawsuits and may make it harder for those negatively affected by the spill to seek claims against the company.

“We are concerned that such action to quickly move money out of corporate coffers to individual investors may make it more difficult to pursue liability claims against the company,” Wyden and his colleagues wrote. “Families of those who died in the disaster, the fishing industry that has been devastated by the oil spill and the governments that have worked full-time to clean up this spill deserve better.”

Read more: http://wyden.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/?id=ac62582e-dbb5-487e-bbe7-241abc42247e