GULFPORT, Miss., Shawwal 15, 1437, Jul 20, 2016, SPA -- A Texas lawyer and six co-defendants fraudulently inflated a client list for lawsuits against BP after the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, a federal prosecutor told jurors Wednesday, according to AP. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jerry Rushing said in his opening statement that the list included people who died before the spill and people whose names and Social Security numbers were used without their permission. Rushing said one reason the list was inflated was so that Watts could get a lucrative spot on the plaintiffs' steering committee, which he described as a group of 22 attorneys who were paid a total of $600 million. Lawyers for three defendants say contract field workers committed fraud and duped their clients. Those defendants included two employees of Watt's law firm and Hector Eloy Guerra, whose lawyer described him as the liaison between the law firm and the field workers. -- SPA 22:49 LOCAL TIME 19:49 GMT www.spa.gov.sa/w