Senators urge DOJ to investigate Transocean money transfer

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and 17 Democratic senators on Monday wrote the Department of Justice urging it to investigate Transocean, the owner of the destroyed oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, and its plan to distribute $1 billion to private shareholders. 

The senators argued the transfer could enhance Transocean's protection from lawsuits and could make it harder for those negatively affected by the oil spill to seek claims against the company. 

"We are concerned that such action to quickly move money out of corporate coffers to individual investors may make it more difficult to pursue liability claims against the company," the letter states.

The idea to transfer money to investors was supposedly the subject of a closed-door meeting of Transocean executives weeks after its oil rig, Deepwater Horizon, was destroyed and began pumping massive amounts of oil into the Gulf that has now hit land.  

According to the senators, Transocean stands to make $270 million in profit from insurance on the destroyed rig, having insured it for more than it was worth. 

"Transocean's stockholders shouldn't take huge profits from polluting our country's Gulf Coast," the senators' letter states.

The letter is co-signed by Democratic Sens. Patrick Leahy (Vt.), Charles Schumer (N.Y.), Tom Harkin (Iowa), Robert Menendez (N.J.), Mark Begich (Alaska), Byron Dorgan (N.D.), Patty Murray (Wash.), Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.), Bill Nelson (Fla.), Mark Pryor (Ark.), Mark Udall (Colo.), Jeff Merkley (Ore.), Max Baucus (Mont.), Amy Klobuchar (Minn.), Michael Bennet (Colo.), Blanche Lincoln (Ark.), and Bob Casey Jr. (Pa.).