Lender and Fiduciary Environmental Liability Claims

Various state and federal statutory provisions protect lenders and fiduciaries from environmental liability when they foreclose on or take possession of environmentally impaired properties and must preserve those assets. We have represented lenders and fiduciaries with regard to their environmental liabilities at contaminated sites, both in litigation and in pre-litigation counseling.

For instance, we represented a lender in one of the first cases asserting a defense under the lender liability provisions of the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act. In this matter, we were able to successfully settle our client out for a nominal sum in a case that was subsequently litigated by the remaining parties for approximately a decade.