Rise of the Cajun Mariners by Woody Falgoux

Author:Woody Falgoux
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Published: 2017-04-11T04:00:00+00:00

While Bobby looked for a “quick” political fix, his old friend from his Quarantine Bay days, Sidney Savoie, was grinding through the sixties. Unlike Bobby, Sidney had no political tricks in his bag. He and his United Tugs partners finally did have—after five years and five separate state and federal lawsuits—a trial date in their case against Texaco. The case, which had consolidated into one federal court action in New Orleans, would take two trials, one in 1967 and one in 1969, to resolve the matter. The judge bifurcated the case into separate trials because of the dozens of claims and the scores of factual and legal issues, some of which had never been decided by any American court.

In all, nearly seventy parties joined the action. They ranged from giant corporations such as Southern Bell and Ingersoll-Rand to small mom-and-pops such as Vela’s Garage and the Barataria Tavern Service Station.

At the heart of the proceeding was the plight of United Tugs. From United Tugs’ perspective, Texaco and its bond insurer, Continental Casualty, were trying to make the case more complicated than it needed to be. The corporate powers were trying to file as many motions, write as many lengthy briefs, propound as much discovery, and ask for as many continuances as they possibly could. They wanted to browbeat their little guy opponents into submission and to discourage them from vigorously pursuing their claims. They were trying to bury the real issues in legal morass and take the court’s eye away from the crux of the matter: all these companies, big and small, had helped Texaco build a crucial, lucrative pipeline, and Texaco had not fully paid them for their services.

In Sidney Savoie and United Tugs’ case, it was the Cajuns versus Big City Oil. It was English-as-a-second-language, undereducated witnesses versus smooth-talking, college-lettered executive witnesses. It was country, Lafourche-accented lawyers versus the New Orleans blue-blooded elite.

Texaco’s position confounded Sidney. The oil company and its legal forces had gone to illogical lengths to deny United Tugs just compensation. The principal amount of the debt was $78,066.96, a lot of money to United Tugs in the 1960s and a very small pittance to Texaco. If Texaco lost the suit, it would be forced to pay United Tugs’ principal, daily interest from August 3, 1962, plus its costs and attorney fees.

Rather than Texaco trying to make an early, sensible settlement, their attorneys conjured up new and sometimes absurd arguments about why Texaco shouldn’t pay full price for a profitable product.

At first blush, the case called for a straightforward application of construction lien law. Louisiana’s version of the law, the Private Works Act, protected the people who performed work at a job site or supplied it with materials. The act gave these contractors and suppliers a lien against the site and the structure erected on it.

In the oilfield, Louisiana law also gave certain contractors and suppliers the protection of the Oil Well Lien Statute, which applied the logic and policy of the Private Works Act to oil wells.

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