Accusations Flare Over Oil-Spray Deposition

Scheduling the deposition of an oil refinery executive has proved slippery business, according to attorneys for Crucians claiming damages for homes sprayed with pollutants more than four years ago. Attorneys for the executive and the refinery’s current owner claim otherwise.

Oil refinery manager Fermin Rodriguez did not appear for a scheduled deposition Tuesday morning despite a federal judge’s order. After nearly a year of fruitless requests for Rodriguez to sit for legally-binding questions about the 2021 petroleum spray — following an attempted restart of the long-shuttered refinery — he has one more chance before possibly being found in contempt.

Rodriguez, a Port Hamilton Refining and Transportation employee, worked for former refinery owners, Limetree Bay, during the attempted restart.

Attorneys for the people with fouled cisterns told the court that, in January, Rodriguez’s attorney in Florida said the vice president and refinery manager was not available to speak until February, then May, then July — despite working a 15-minute drive from the proposed deposition site, the office of attorney Lee Rohn.