OKLAHOMA CITY — A Native American tribe here has filed a lawsuit in its own tribal court system accusing several oil companies of causing an earthquake that damaged near-century-old tribal buildings.
The
Pawnee Nation alleges in its lawsuit filed Friday that wastewater
injected into wells operated by the defendants caused the 5.8-magnitude
quake in September. The tribe is seeking compensation for damage to
public and personal property and market value losses, as well as
punitive damages.
The case will be heard in the tribe’s district court, with a jury composed of Pawnee Nation members.
“We
are a sovereign nation and we have the rule of law here,” said Andrew
Knife Chief, the Pawnee Nation’s executive director. “We’re using our
tribal laws, our tribal processes, to hold these guys accountable.”
Lawyers
representing the 3,200-member tribe in north central Oklahoma say the
lawsuit is the first earthquake-related litigation filed in a tribal
court. If an appeal were filed in a jury decision, it could be heard by a
five-member tribal Supreme Court, and that decision would be final.
“Usually
tribes have their own appellate process, and then — and this surprises a
lot of people — there is no appeal from a tribal supreme court,” said
Lindsay G. Robertson, a law professor at the University of Oklahoma who
specializes in federal Indian law.
Once
a tribal court judgment is made, it can be taken to a state district
court for enforcement just like any other judgment, Professor Robertson
said, but that enforcement action would not subject the judgment to any
appeals in state court.
Curt
Marshall, one of the lawyers representing the Pawnee Nation, said the
lawsuit was filed in tribal court primarily so that the Pawnee Nation
could assert its sovereignty.
“The
tribe has jurisdiction over civil matters to enforce judgments within
its jurisdiction, including judgments over non-Indians,” Mr. Marshall
said.
While
experts say major civil judgments against non-Indians in tribal courts
are rare, the United States Supreme Court last year left in place the authority of Native American courts to judge complaints against people who are not tribal members.
Scientists
have linked the dramatic spike in earthquakes in Oklahoma to the
underground disposal of wastewater that is a byproduct of oil and gas
drilling. Oklahoma Corporation Commission regulators have directed oil
and gas producers to either close injection wells or reduce the volume
of fluids they inject.
The
quake, located about nine miles from the center of Pawnee, Okla.,
damaged buildings across the north-central community of about 2,200
residents. The sandstone facade of some buildings fell and several
others were cracked. One man suffered a minor injury when part of a
fireplace fell on his head. Oklahoma’s governor declared a state of
emergency for the entire county.
A
lawyer for Cummings Oil Company in Oklahoma City, one of the companies
named in the suit, declined to comment until the filing had been
reviewed. Telephone messages left with a lawyer for a second defendant,
Eagle Road Oil in Tulsa, were not immediately returned.
Chad
Warmington, the president of the Oklahoma Oil and Gas Association, said
that while the tribal jurisdiction was unique, the lawsuit itself was
not a surprise.
“The
oil and gas industry has been the target of significant litigation over
the years, so I wouldn’t think it comes as a surprise that there could
be potential new litigation,” he said.
Among
the tribal structures damaged in the September earthquake is the former
Pawnee Nation Indian School, a sandstone building on the National
Register of Historic Places that houses the tribe’s administrative
offices.
“We
have extensive cracks throughout all the walls on every single one of
these historic buildings, and the cracks run through the entire width of
the walls,” Knife Chief said. “We had mortar pop. We had roofs sag. We
have ceilings that are bowing.”
According
to the lawsuit, both companies were operating wastewater injection
wells on lands within the Pawnee Nation less than 10 miles from the
epicenter of the Sept. 3 quake.
From
1980 to 2000, Oklahoma averaged only two earthquakes a year of
magnitude 2.7 or higher. That number jumped to about 2,500 in 2014, then
to 4,000 in 2015 amid a boom in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking — the
process of injecting a high-pressure mix of water, sand or gravel and
chemicals into rock to extract oil and gas. It dropped to 2,500 last
year, after Oklahoma restricted the volume of wastewater injections,
according to a new study by the federal Geological Survey. The agency
reported on Wednesday in its annual national earthquake outlook that a
large portion of Oklahoma and parts of Central California were at the
highest risk for a damaging quake this year.
At
least four class-action lawsuits have been filed by the same group of
lawyers against various oil companies in Oklahoma connected to large
earthquakes dating to 2011. Another lawsuit has been filed on behalf of a
Prague, Okla., woman injured when a November 2011 quake toppled a stone
chimney in her home.
“We
understand the industry is very important to the economy of Oklahoma,
and the last thing we want to do is come in and shut the operations
down,” said Mr. Marshall, the tribe’s lawyer. “But we do want the oil
and gas industry to act responsibly environmentally, and we want them to
be held accountable for the damage they’ve created.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/04/us/pawnee-nation-oklahoma-oil-earthquake-lawsuit.html?_r=0
No comments :
Post a Comment