Brazil dam collapse class action lawsuit against Anglo-Australian mining company begins in England – JURIST

The trial for a class action lawsuit against Anglo-Australian multinational mining company BHP began on Monday in England, with 620,000 claimants seeking damages for the collapse of a tailings pond dam in Brazil that killed 19 and released 50 million cubic metres of toxic waste into the environment.

There are additional class action lawsuits as a result of the collapse currently underway in Brazil, the Netherlands and Australia. A preliminary settlement agreement in Brazil that would see the companies that owned the dam pay a total of approximately US$31.7 billion was announced on Saturday, but the settlement agreement has yet to be finalized as negotiations between the ownership companies are ongoing.

BHP argues that the lawsuit in the English court should be dismissed because it duplicates earlier legal proceedings in Brazil. Pogust Goodhead, the law firm representing the victims of the dam collapse in England, contends that the Brazilian settlement is irrelevant because it was negotiated behind closed doors and the claimants in the English case were not consulted or included. Pogust Goodhead claims that the tentative settlement in Brazil provides the individual victims of the disaster with no adequate remedy.

The claimants in the English case include approximately 620,000 individual victims, Indigenous communities, 46 municipalities, 1,500 companies and faith based institutions.

The dam was owned by Samarco, a company jointly owned by BHP and Vale. BHP submitted a claim that Vale should be held jointly responsible in the English case if BHP loses. Vale is also currently fighting a US$3.8B class action lawsuit in the Netherlands, which was launched in March.

The collapse of the Fundão dam occurred on November 5, 2015 in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. A mining tailings pond was allegedly overfilled, resulting in the failure of the dam and the spilling of toxic mud. As a result, 19 people were killed and many villages destroyed.