(Times-Picayune) The most expensive Katrina claims filed so far against the Army Corps of Engineers -- those specifying damages of at least billion each -- total quadrillion, according to a thumbnail set of figures released Monday by the agency. That's ,013,283,057,589,910, to be exact. And no cents. One claim alone accounts for all but .3 trillion of the total, and that one came from Baker -- 93 miles northwest of New Orleans and far outside the Katrina flood zone. Federal privacy laws prohibit the corps and plaintiffs' attorneys from identifying claimants by name, so the basis for the Baker claim was not immediately clear. The corps released a list of 247 claims of billion or more in response to requests from news organizations. Most claims were filed by individuals. Fourteen of them included compensation requests for "wrongful deaths." The list includes a billion claim filed by the city of New Orleans, which is a matter of public record, as well as three claims by unnamed insurance companies, according to the Bruno & Bruno law firm, which represents thousands of hurricane victims. Anyone seeking to collect damages from the federal government must first submit a Form 95, which preserves the right to sue. Almost a half-million such forms have been filed with the corps since levees and floodwalls failed during Katrina, triggering catastrophic flooding that killed more than 1,500 people in Louisiana and ruined homes and businesses. Though the accounting is far from finished, it is generally considered the costliest disaster in U.S. history. The corps reports receiving 489,000 claims as of Monday. But corps spokeswoman Amanda Jones said that a number of those are duplicates. At the same time, some claims are still being filed, and the corps is adding them to the agency database, Jones said. The filing deadline was Aug. 29, and a lawyer involved in some of the cases said a federal judge will ultimately decide whether to accept claims filed after date. Lawyer Joe Bruno, who said he represents about 70,000 Katrina victims, is concerned that the dollar value of claims listed on the Form 95s will be used to vilify Katrina victims. "It will be obscene if anyone uses these to paint our people as being a bunch of money-grubbers," he said. "The forms are a joke, but the government requires them.

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