Chevron, Shell, Exxon Class Action Alleges Calif. Price-Fixing Scheme

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Chevron, Exxon, Valero, Shell and other major oil companies have conspired together to keep gas prices artificially high in the state of California, according to a class action lawsuit. 

Plaintiffs Richard Bartlett and Kristine Snyder say that while the rest of the nation saw a decline in gas prices, California drivers experienced two “massive” price spikes in 2012 and 2015 that resulted in residents paying between $4 and $5 per gallon. 

The Chevron, Exxon gas price class action lawsuit claims that this price surge was at least $1.50 higher than the cost of fuel in other states. 

According to the Shell class action lawsuit, these price spikes were attributed to a BP West oil refinery fire and a Torrance refinery explosion. However, the plaintiffs say the gas companies used the fire and explosion to “create a false impression of a shortage in order to force prices up and reap windfall profits.” 

For example, the Exxon gas prices class action lawsuit claims that the company could have used fuel from other states or their international refineries to make up the shortage caused by the Torrance explosion. 

However, instead of bringing “badly-needed imports to the market during the height of Southern California’s gasoline price spike and summer driving season, ExxonMobil kept its vessel, the S/R American Progress, in the U.S. Gulf Coast for four months before idling it in Singapore for seventy days,” the Exxon class action states.

“By making its tanker unavailable at a critical time, ExxonMobil ensured that California gasoline supplies were kept short, driving up prices and ExxonMobil’s profits.” 

The California gas price class action lawsuit states that Exxon’s behavior after the Torrance explosion along with other gas companies’ decision to export fuel from California at the same time artificially decreased the supply of gas and points to a price-fixing scheme at the expense of California drivers.

“Even after the Torrance refinery came back online, Californians have continued to pay an unexplained surcharge for their gasoline (even after taking into account California’s taxes and other unique aspects),” the ExxonMobil class action lawsuit claims.

Bartlett and Snyder say the anticompetitive behavior of these gas companies has resulted in California residents paying $10 billion more than other drivers across the U.S.

“For years Californians have seen spikes in gasoline prices, seemingly untethered to normal market forces of supply and demand, and an average price per gallon substantially above the national average,” the Exxon, Chevron class action lawsuit claims. “An analysis of the now available data shows that this increased gas prices were not the result of California’s market structure, but instead are the result of defendants’ anticompetitive conduct.”

The Chevron gas price class action lawsuit alleges that the anticompetitive behavior of the defendants violates California’s Unfair Competition Law and California’s Cartwright Act.

The plaintiffs are represented by Brian J. Robbins, Georgia Aguilar and Michael Nicoud of Robbins Arroyo LLP. 

The Exxon, Shell, Valero, Chevron Gas Price Increase Class Action Lawsuit is Bartlett, et al. v. BP West Coast Products LLC, et al., Case No. 3:18­-cv­-01374, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.