Mayflower Oil Spill Attorneys note the one-year anniversary of the March 29, 2013 rupture of the ExxonMobil Pegasus Pipeline with a renewed call for affected residents to seek legal counsel. As previously reported here, lawsuits have been filed against Exxon for compensation on behalf of residents impacted by the spill, and it is still not too late for others to join the pending legal action.
From the beginning, attorneys have advised caution in dealing with Exxon without legal representation, and a recent article from the Arkansas Times demonstrates why that advice is even more important today than in the initial weeks following the spill. The article reports on one affected resident’s experience with the Exxon claims process as follows:
The friendly claims people she’d dealt with at first had left town, replaced by a hardball negotiator — “a killer,” said [the resident] — who pressured the remaining families to accept the deals as offered.
I had no problem with Exxon this entire time. Things got rough in about July, August, and that’s when it all went downhill,” [the resident] said. “It went from me really thinking they cared and were sorry and were going to make it right to they were going to screw us any way they could and they really didn’t care.
…
The claims negotiator, she said, continued to lean heavily on all the families remaining.
…
There was no negotiating. We were told ‘Take it or leave it, but this is the best you will ever get.’ They will continue to file appeal after appeal and draw it out as long as they can, and you will end up with nothing in the end. The scare tactics were not only to me. It caused most of the others to just settle and be done, because they were already moving on to their new homes.
It was a tactic of bullying. Basically, we’ll bully you until you break and you either sell to us or you settle with us, and I wouldn’t do either.
Despite Exxon’s repeated public assurances that it will honor all “valid claims” relating to the Mayflower Oil Spill, the experience of the resident featured in the Arkansas Times article, in addition to that of other affected residents, paints a starkly different picture of the way that the company is dealing with those impacted by the spill.
For this reason, Mayflower Oil Spill attorneys renew their caution that those dealing directly with Exxon without an attorney, or who assume that the previous offers of compromise made by Exxon are the extent of any compensation owed by the company, could risk compromising their right to recover the full extent of the damages owed as a result of the oil spill. Johnson Firm is working with Hare Wynn Newell & Newton in representing individuals who have been affected by the Mayflower, Arkansas oil spill. For additional information, please call 501-372-1300 or submit the online form on this page.
