"Who Decides if a BP Spill Claim Is Legitimate?"

"Legitimate. It's the word that could come to define the extremely expensive, extremely litigious aftermath of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Almost from the beginning, BP has promised to pay what it calls all 'legitimate' claims by people and businesses affected by the spill. But legitimate, when it's contained in a print ad as part of BP's new multimillion-dollar campaign or poshly pronounced by CEO Tony Hayward in one of the accompanying TV commercials, sounds very different from the way it sounds coming out of the mouth of a bayou shrimper in Venice, La. What constitutes legitimate is still an open question.

At the very least though, it looks like BP won't be the only one who gets to decide."

Bryan Walsh reports for TIME June 11, 2010.

SEE ALSO:

"The Rig's on Fire! I Told You This Was Gonna Happen!" (Mother Jones)

"First the Spill, Then the Lawsuits" (New York Times)

"Extent Of BP's Liability Still Murky" (NPR)