BP engineer who wrote telling e-mails pleads the Fifth to avoid testifying at oil spill hearings

[sabra]

Source: NOLA

A key witness in the federal investigation of what went wrong on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig has pleaded the Fifth to avoid testifying in Houston on Tuesday.

Brian Morel, a BP engineer who was part of a team that designed the Macondo well that blew April 20, is the second witness to invoke his constitutional right to not answer questions from a joint Coast Guard and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management panel.

William W. Taylor, Morel's attorney, appeared before the panel Tuesday and said Morel would have declined to answer any questions from the panel, citing his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself.

Morel is significant because of e-mail messages he sent and received in the days leading up to the disaster. Those messages were released by a congressional committee.

In one, Morel referred to the project as a "nightmare well." In another, he commented on the time and money BP would save by using a single, long production string of casing in the middle of the well, rather than another plan that would have shut off the space through which dangerous gas could flow.

Read more: http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/08/oil_spill_hearings_bp_engineer.html

[superconnected]

1. Scumbag. People died on there and he wants to protect himself.

[melm00se]

3. how dare he!!!!

exercising his Constitutional right against self-incrimination.

bastard

:sarcasm:

[KansDem]

4. Remember when right-wingers and conservatives automatically assumed you were guilty...

...if you plead the Fifth?

Now CorpAmerica is doing it. Let's see how many right-wingers and conservatives chastise BP...

[jaybeat]

5. There are rights and there are duties

He has the right to shut his trap, if he values protecting his own freedom from prosecution above all else.

However he has a duty to his fellow oil workers who died, to everyone else affected by this disaster, and to the Earth, our one and only home, to tell the truth and cooperate fully with any and all investigations and let the personal consequences be what they will. As a citizen of the world, he cannot live without others, and it is too bad (though not surprising in our "me first," "don't blame me, I was just following orders," individual uber alles culture) that he chose to exercise those rights instead of doing his duty.

[melm00se]

7. i sure don't want you

representing me as an attorney.

using your reasoning, there would never be any reason for a trial as every person perceived as guilty should immediately fling themselves at the mercy of the justice system.

[superconnected]

11. He's ultimately protecting BP.

[melm00se]

14. then immunize him from prosecution

and his 5th amendment rights are no longer necessary

[Trajan]

16. If a man commits an act that results in the death of an innocent human being

Then does he ever have an obligation; to society, to his family, to his own honor, to accept the consequences of his own actions ?

Yeah .... of course they will use whatever legal subterfuge that the law provides, but that does not satisfy the ethical and moral issues that are rightly introduced.

Only the most cynical accept evasion as the 'right' choice ....

[Posteritatis]

10. "it is too bad that he chose to exercise those rights"... classy. (nt)

[Javaman]

15. Some people on this board make me wonder...

while the right wing screams and yells about wanting to over turn the 14th and 17th amendments, we have our own here who feel that the 5th amendment is only reserved for those who people who are perceived as innocent. Those who are perceived to be guilty can go screw themselves.

Really sad statement on our society.

Many people, apparently some here on DU, fail to understand why the founding fathers felt it so important to have the 5th amendment. Self incrimination was part and parcel of the military judges under British rule.

[Posteritatis]

18. They don't seem too clear on how it works, either

I've been seeing people saying taking the fifth is self-incrimination and should be treated as such in the courtroom, because, as you say, they see it as "we all know they're guilty anyway" or something.

I've long found it interesting how quickly the little authoritarians come out of the woodwork whenever the topic of discussion's someone they dislike, for good reason or otherwise. It's like people actually do want one set of laws for themselves and another for their enemies.

[Psephos]

19. Both you and Javaman speak for me as well. n/t

[hugo_from_TN]

20. Isn't that what the anti-Mosque types say?

They have the right to build but they shouldn't exercise that right.

[Poboy]

2. k&r!

[Mr. Sparkle]

6. That is not very moral of Mister Morel's.

He knows he is in deep do-do, and any competent lawyer would tell him, not to talk for fear of getting into even more trouble. But with that he looks more guilty in the publics eyes.

[JDPriestly]

8. He has a right to remain silent.

Of course, that means that the only way that we will find out what happened is to review all the documents.

Why haven't criminal charges been brought already? Why are we messing with all these toothless commissions? I'm thinking not only of the inquiries regarding the BP spill, but also the disasters in the mortgage industry and the financial sectors of our economy. Why don't we use the courts? The Constitution does not provide for the calling of commissions as a substitute for investigating crimes. What is going on here?

These commissions just compound crimes with government corruption.

[Robbien]

9. These commissions are the smokescreen

The government doesn't want their good buddies in BigBusiness prosecuted. So congress holds a commission whose sole purpose is to pass away time. Public's attention moves on to the next atrocity and the original problem just fades away.

[JDPriestly]

13. +1

[populistdriven]

12. can we oil board him?

[howaboutme]

17. Why not give him immunity

for testimony to bag the big boys like the CEO? Isn't that the way they typically work these investigations?