On June 28, 2021, a summer wave saw an increase in temperature in Seattle to higher than 42 degrees Celsius (108 ° F), which was recorded in the US coastal city. That day, Juliana Leon was found unconscious in her car and died soon from hyperthermia – overheating of the body.
Now his daughter, Misty Leone, is sueing seven oil and gas company for wrong death in a court in Washington State. She alleges that she accelerated excessive heat, causing her mother to die of fossil fuel manufacturing and marketing.
Filled claims Companies including Exon Mobil, Chevron, Shell and BP – had known for decades “that giger fossil fuel products were already turning into the Earth’s atmosphere.”
The defendants created a “fossil fuel-dependent economy”, resulting in “more frequent and destructive weather disasters and foresight of human life,” allegations of complaint.
In the first incorrect death claim of its kind, a win for Leon Odiger “represents a historic change in climate litigation,” Maria Antonia Tigre said, Director of Global Climate Litement at Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, New York City.
While climate litigation has been “honored” in very few cases, the success in Seattle may seek “compensatory and even sponative damage” to individuals from fossil fuel corporations in climate change, Tigre explained.
In addition to demanding damage, the plaintiff wants the defendants to fund the “Public Education” campaign to improve the decades of wrong information – Joe Lyon said that the “consumer confusion” has been promoted about the link below fossil fuels and planetary heating.
Chevron, BP, Shell and Konocophilips did not respond to the DW request to comment on the case.
Rejects claims in Big Oil case
One of the world’s largest oil and gas producers, the Chevron Corporation has dismissed the claims made in the trial.
“The exploitation of an individual tragedy to promote political climate torture litigation is contrary to law, science and general knowledge,” Chevron spokesman Theodore Butries Jr. said in a statement to American public broadcaster NPR.
He said, “The court should add this far -reaching claim to the growing list of meritless climate cases which have already been rejected by the state and federal courts,” he said.
But according to Tigre, the case “can make a novel for liability but admirable basis.” Filing is BAs opposed to national laws, torture is discovered as an emission regulations on law, which have underlined the cases of climate litigation.
tort law Claims seek damage to individuals affected by climate change, said Ribbachah Brandi-Touler, a research companion at the Melbourne Climate Futures Think Tank in Australia.
In the past, such citizens have been an important meeting for individuals to “seek” to “prevention” against major tobacco or asbestos companies, explaining by the researcher. A Pennsylvania man was awarded $ 3.8 million (€ 3.5 million) from his employer in 2024, which was for contracting mesotheloma due to asbestos exposure. Climate cases are “not different,” he said.
“Big oil companies are already facing climate insane and damage dozens of state and local government cases at the US-based Climate Think Tank Center for Climate Integrity,” said Alyssa Johal, Vice President of the Legal and General Counsel, said Alyssa Johal said.
But as this is the latest case “the first files on Behehen from a personal climate victim,” he said, it represents “another step towards accountability”.
Brandi-tower said that pre-time laws can be “tangent relevant” for this claim even in climate affairs.
In 2015, a historic Dutch climate change lawsuit, known as the Urenda case, employed the torture law theory of “dangerous negligence” to argue that the government’s inaction on climate change violated the care of its citizens. The ruling the Dutch government forced the Dutch government to increase the goals of emissions reduction.
Another recent case in Germany, where a confined farmer sued the energy veteran RWE for contributing to the risk of glacial melting and flood, which was a threat to his home, what is another attempt by a person to seek climate damage.
In May, the final judge said, “While the case was not on the merit stage, the court admitted that, in principle, a private emitter may be a hero leable for the ratio of compensation.”
‘Atribution science’ key to prove the responsibility for the summer wave
Tigre stated that the science of the weather, which shows the possibility of climate change extreme weather events, is more likely as wildfire, floods or summer waves, “will be central for the case,” Tigre said.
The 2021 summer wave with the US West Coast has called the Pacific Northwest Heat Dome-Villad-Wold “almost impossible” bees without human-made climate change, At that time according to rapid analysis,
The temperature of the research that continued for three days remained “at least 150 times rare” without climate change.
It is estimated to be once every 1,000 years, the search extreme heat wuldead is around every five to 10 years, as predicted, the global temperature in the early 2040s in the early 2040s 2 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit).
Summer is called a “silent killer” and between 2000-2019, 489,000 people died annually, 2024 United Nations Report NoteThe US and Canada resulted in about 850 deaths related to high temperatures in the US and Canada as a result of the Pacific Northwest Heat Dome event.
But Tigre said that the problem for Misty Leone’s claim against oil companies would assure the court of the “specific” contribution of the defendants in global emissions.
“Even if we are able to say that climate change caused an event, how much did a company contribute to it?” Asked Brandi-Tawlar. “It’s difficult.”
A potential ‘new wave’ of litigation
Without, he said that “health arguments” are becoming common in climate cases, which are now about 3000 numbers worldwide and around the world, which is in accordance with climate change lawsuit run by climate change law.
If the case of the state of Washington is successful, it will set up a historical example “to harm the functions of fossil fuel companies directly by individuals,” said the market-tower.
Developing legal principles, searching as “climate murder or corporate mangilatter”, who takes the step of looking for a criminal as opposed to a citizen’s punishment, can be helped by a successful testing, Tigre said.
“An example detection will increase a new wave of litigation,” he said.
Edited by: Jennifer Colins
