Court Rejects Louisiana Oil Worker’s Claim for Medical Monitoring

NEW ORLEANS — An oilfield production worker who says he was exposed to dangerously high levels of radioactivity while cleaning drilling equipment in the 1970s cannot pursue a medical monitoring claim because it has not been prescribed by a qualified physician, a federal judge has ruled. Hill v. Exxon Mobil Corp., et al., No. 11-2786 (E.D. La.).

Judge Sarah S. Vance of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana agreed with oil company defendants May 18 in concluding that Clarence Hill’s monitoring claim failed to meet the criteria set out by the Louisiana Supreme Court in Bourgeois …