Engineer first to face criminal charges in 2010 BP spill

Engineer first to face criminal charges in 2010 BP spill Two years after the BP drilling rig exploded and triggered the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history, some scientists and residents say they are starting to see signs of environmental damage in fish and other marine life in the Gulf Coast – which is a vital part of the local economy. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., discusses. By Miguel Llanos, msnbc.com The first criminal charges in the 2010 BP gulf spill were filed on Tuesday against a former BP engineer accused of intentionally deleting hundreds of text messages about the size of the spill. Kurt Mix, 50, was arrested earlier Tuesday and was set to appear in federal court in Houston, Texas, later in the day on two charges of obstruction of justice. "The department has filed initial charges in its investigation into the Deepwater Horizon disaster against an individual for allegedly deleting records relating to the amount of oil flowing from the Macondo well after the explosion," U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Advertise | AdChoices "The Deepwater Horizon Task Force is continuing its investigation into the explosion and will hold accountable those who violated the law in connection with the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history," he added. In the complaint, Mix is accused of deleting text messages on two occasions. Those messages were later retrieved, the Justice Department said. In one thread, Mix allegedly deleted a string of some 200 messages that had to do with a process dubbed "Top Kill" that was aimed at stopping the spill. "Too much flowrate – over 15,000" barrels of oil per day, Mix allegedly said in one text. Ken Feinberg, former BP claims administrator, talks with MSNBC's Alex Wagner and the NOW panel about the progress that's been made in the two years following the BP oil spill. "At the time," the Justice Department noted, "BP’s public estimate of the flow rate was 5,000 BOPD -- three times lower than the minimum flow rate indicated in Mix’s text." "Before Top Kill commenced," the agency added, "Mix and other engineers had concluded internally that Top Kill was unlikely to succeed if the flow rate was greater than 15,000 barrels of oil per day." If convicted, Mix, a resident of Katy, Texas, faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 for each of the two criminal counts against him. Lawsuits have been filed seeking financial compensation from BP, and the oil giant has reached a tentative $8 billion settlement with thousands of individuals and businesses. BP announced a $7.8 billion settlement in covering the economic loss and medical costs to the plaintiffs affected by the oil spill in the Gulf Coast. Dean Blanchard, owner of "Dean Blanchard Seafood," is one of those plaintiffs and shares his story of how the oil disaster changed his life. In addition, the U.S. government is expected to seek billions of dollars in environmental fines. But Tuesday's charges were the first against an individual in the blast that killed 11 workers and spilled 200 million gallons of crude into the Gulf of Mexico.