The Federal Government has a strict criminal statute within the Clean Water Act which makes it a federal crime to negligently spill any pollutant into US waters. Given the fact that BP had no plan to deal with a blow out at this well, they were by force negligent. There are many other apparent negligent acts which have been reported including skipping critical tests of the cement and modifying the blow out preventer in a non approved way.
to read more about the use of this statute look here:
http://www.hunton.com/...
There should be both individual criminal culpability for executives in the line of decsion making and corporate criminal liability - a la Anderson - for BP as a whole.
It would be good law, good governance and great politics for the DOJ to start handcuffing BP execs as soon as the well has been stopped. I thought perhaps Obama should have a summit with the board and key execs of BP and then perp walk them all out in cuffs. Good TV that.
I believe politically and practically the government has to wait until the well has been capped somehow or BP will blame the criminal charges for delaying a solution.