On March 3, 2015, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma denied class certification in the case of Mitchell McCormick, et al. v. Halliburton Co., et al., Case No. 5:11-cv-01271. In this case, a group of homeowners living near a contaminated research facility site belonging to Halliburton Energy Services, Inc. sued the company, asking it to clean up the contamination, and seeking damages for personal injuries, property damage, and medical monitoring. The plaintiffs claimed that contaminated groundwater near Halliburton’s Osage Road facility in Duncan, Oklahoma had migrated into their neighborhood.
The Osage Road facility was used between 1965 and 1990 to clean U.S. Department of Defense missile casings and to recycle fuel rods. According to the State of Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality website, there is an area of groundwater near the facility which has been contaminated with ammonium perchlorate. Halliburton is in the process of voluntarily cleaning up contaminated private water wells in the area.
While ammonium perchlorate is not currently regulated by the EPA or the State of Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality, the EPA has issued a health advisory regarding perchlorate in drinking water.
In the ruling on class certification, the court found that issues of law and fact related to the individual members of the proposed class outweighed the characteristics common to the proposed class. Therefore, the class could not be certified under FRCP 23(b)(3).
The court’s opinion is available on PACER. For more information, contact Toni Ellington at (504) 599-8500.
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