An editorial from The Inter-Mountain
ELKINS, W.Va. — Too often, companies that hurt people through incompetence or intent slip through legal loopholes to escape justice. Thanks to U.S. District Judge John Copenhaver, it didn’t happen this week in West Virginia.
Hundreds of thousands of people and businesses were without water service for several days after a 2014 chemical spill into a river at Charleston. Before service was shut off, some who drank the water or bathed in it sought treatment at hospitals.
The chemical came from a tank operated by Freedom Industries. The company and some of its officials have been subjects of both criminal and civil court action.
Among lawsuits filed after the spill was one against West Virginia American Water Co., which serves the affected area, and Eastman Chemical. West Virginia American was accused of not preparing adequately for such a spill and not handling the one that occurred properly. Eastman was alleged to have failed to inform Freedom Industries of the dangers of the chemical that leaked.
A tentative settlement of that lawsuit, costing West Virginia American $126 million and Eastman $25 million, was approved this week in Copenhaver’s court in Charleston.
But the settlement came with a twist. Apparently, West Virginia American had left open the possibility it would cover its share of the settlement by seeking a rate increase from its customers — the very people affected by the spill.
That is precisely the sort of trickery that too often allows corporations to escape real consequences for misdeeds.
Allowing that in this case would have made the settlement “a fool’s errand,” Copenhaver remarked.
He made it clear no such safety valve would be available to West Virginia American. Costs of the settlement will have to be paid by the firm’s stockholders and investors, who may well take their anger out on company executives.
Good for Copenhaver for insisting on a settlement with real deterrent value. To have done less, as the judge noted, “is not acceptable.”