KTUU.com | Alaska's news and information source | No decision yet on Exxon Valdez case
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An estimated 8,000 of the original plaintiffs have died since 1994. (KTUU-TV)
The amount of the Alaska coastline covered in oil from the Exxon Valdez spill equals California's entire coastline. (KTUU-TV)
If the amount of oil spilled were placed in gallon-sized milk jugs, and they were placed side-by-side, they would stretch the entire length of the pipeline, with more than 100 miles left over. (KTUU-TV)by Casey Grove
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Updated Monday, June 23, 2008
ANCHORAGE-Alaska -- A ruling was expected Monday from the U.S. Supreme Court on the almost 20-year-old class-action lawsuit that followed the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill.
The court released other decisions this morning. It declined to halt the Bush administration from circumventing environmental reviews for a planned border fence between the U.S. and Mexico. But no decision came down on the Valdez case.
A decision is now all but assured for Wednesday before the court adjourns for this session.
After Exxon's 11 million gallons of crude oil decimated fish and wildlife populations along Prince William Sound, an Anchorage jury awarded fishermen $5 billion in punitive damages. Many appeals and reductions later, the original settlement was reduced to $2.5 billion.
Now the lawsuit's fate lies with the eight Supreme Court Justices. The ninth, Justice Samuel Alito, recused himself because he owns stock in ExxonMobil Corp.
The suit could be a potential landmark decision for lower courts dealing with punitive damages awarded against large corporations, said Ted Frank, director of the American Enterprise Institute Legal Center, a non-profit research institution in Washington, D.C.
"The Supreme Court will be giving guidance on how lower federal courts should be deciding these sorts of issues," Frank said. "When are punitive damages appropriate and how should they be calculated?"
The lower courts in Alaska and California permitted punitive damages -- damages based on the company's overall worth -- after Exxon already paid compensatory damages, Frank said. That raises an important question, he said.
"The question is whether it's fundamentally fair to award billions of dollars in damages simply because it's such a big company," Frank said.
The fact that only eight justices will rule on the suit presents an interesting separate issue, Frank said.
"A four-four tie acts as if there's no decision at all," he said.
And that puts the party appealing a decision -- in this case, Exxon -- at a big disadvantage, Frank said.
There are only two more sessions before the justices break for summer, and they almost always rule before the break, at the end of June.
Contact Casey Grove at cgrove@ktuu.com
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