Grim Legacy of Exxon Still Haunts Alaska

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Grim Legacy of Exxon Still Haunts Alaska
by Robert Barnes


WASHINGTON - When a federal jury in Alaska in 1994 ordered Exxon to pay $5 billion to thousands of people who had their lives disrupted by the massive Exxon Valdez oil spill, an appeal of the nation’s largest punitive damages award was inevitable.0225 01

But almost no one could have predicted the incredible round of legal ping-pong that only this week will reach the Supreme Court.

In the time span of the battle - 14 years after the verdict, nearly two decades since the spill itself - claimants’ lawyers say there is a new statistic to add to the grim legacy of the disaster in Prince William Sound: Nearly 20 percent of the 33,000 fishermen, Native Alaskans, cannery workers, and others who triumphed in court that day are dead.

“That’s the most upsetting thing, that more than 6,000 people have passed and this still isn’t finished,” said Mike Webber, a Native Alaskan artistic carver and former fisherman in the Prince William Sound community of Cordova. “Our sound is not healthy, and neither are the people. Everything is still on the surface, just as it was.”

The high court is scheduled to hear arguments Wednesday on whether punishment is excessive or even permitted under maritime law. Justice Samuel Alito Jr. owns Exxon stock and has recused himself from the case. That leaves eight justices to hear it, and an even split would mean that the award stands. In the eyes of the justices, the case may turn on an 1818 Supreme Court decision that restricts the liability of ship owners for the conduct of their crews, or the more recent damage provisions of the Clean Water Act.

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http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/02/25/7273/