(The Center Square) — Louisiana’s long-running coastal damage lawsuits are shifting into federal court after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling opened a new path for oil and gas companies to move the cases out of state court.
Recent filings include nine Cameron Parish cases in the Western District of Louisiana and two Plaquemines Parish cases in the Eastern District. Dozens of related cases involving Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Bernard and other parishes are already pending in federal court or before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, according to court records.
In several cases, some defendants, including BP and Chevron, have been dismissed, though both remain involved in other coastal litigation. It is unclear from the filings whether those dismissals are final or could be refiled.
The lawsuits, filed by local governments, allege oil and gas companies and their predecessors damaged Louisiana’s coast through decades of exploration, production, canals and pipeline activity that contributed to pollution, wetland loss and habitat destruction.
The latest filings mark a procedural shift in litigation that has stretched for more than a decade. Plaintiffs have generally filed the cases in state court, while defendants have repeatedly sought to move them to federal court.
Daniel Hughes, an attorney who has represented Henry Production Company and other defendants in legacy oilfield cases, said plaintiffs have long tried to avoid federal court.
“They file in state court, and the plaintiffs in these cases do everything they possibly can with their allegations to stay out of federal court,” Hughes said.
He said one strategy has been to include Louisiana-based defendants alongside out-of-state companies, which can block diversity jurisdiction — one of the main paths into federal court.
“What the plaintiffs in most of these cases will do is make sure there are other defendants in Louisiana,” Hughes said. “So even though they’re suing people in Texas and other states, they have enough Louisiana defendants so that destroys diversity.”
Diversity jurisdiction generally allows cases between parties from different states to be heard in federal court when the amount in dispute exceeds a threshold. Including in-state defendants can prevent removal unless a separate federal issue applies.
The recent filings instead rely on federal question arguments, a key issue in the Supreme Court’s ruling. The decision revived defendants’ ability to argue that some parish lawsuits belong in federal court because they involve conduct tied to federal direction, permits or wartime production.
Hughes said he was unsure whether Henry Production Co. had been formally dismissed from the Cameron Parish cases but said the company resolved its liability through bankruptcy after being repeatedly named in lawsuits.
“We settled about four or five of the Henry Production cases, and then they kept on bringing them into additional suits,” Hughes said. “So we just filed bankruptcy and got rid of it all as to Henry.”
The removals do not address the merits of the claims. Instead, they shift the legal fight — at least initially — to whether the cases will proceed in federal court or be sent back to state court.
The filings reflect early fallout from the Supreme Court’s April 17 decision in Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Plaquemines Parish, which found that Chevron had plausibly shown a link between the disputed oil production activities and federal wartime directives tied to aviation fuel production during World War II. That finding allowed the case to proceed in federal court under the federal officer removal statute.
