Family Seeks Big Oil Accountability in Wrongful Death Lawsuit for Climate Related Death

The daughter of a Seattle woman, Juliana Leon, who died during the 2021 Pacific Northwest heat wave, today brought a wrongful death suit alleging that Big Oil companies negligently caused her mother’s death. Aaron Regunberg, accountability project director for Public Citizen’s Climate Program, issued the following statement:

“Lethal climate disasters are the foreseeable, and foreseen, consequences of specific actions by fossil fuel corporations, CEOs, and boards of directors. They caused the climate crisis and deceived the public about the dangerousness of their products in order to block and delay solutions that could prevent heat deaths like Juliana’s. These fossil fuel actors should be held accountable to the victims of their lethal conduct, and this wrongful death suit provides a compelling new approach for climate victims moving forward.

“Wrongful death suits provide private remedies. But Big Oil companies have wronged the public, too, which is why this suit may also help lay the groundwork for another approach to climate accountability: criminal homicide prosecutions. The purpose of criminal law enforcement is to deter future crimes, promote public safety, punish wrongdoers, and encourage the convicted to pursue less harmful practices. All of these public safety goals apply to Big Oil’s continuing contributions to climate change, and prosecutors across the country should take note of this new wrongful death suit and carefully consider how the climate effects their constituents are experiencing fit the criminal laws they are charged with enforcing.”