Seven years after the 1989 Valdez oil spill that covered nearly 1,500 miles of Alaskan coastline with 11 million gallons of crude oil, a federal appeals court ruled in behalf of Exxon Mobile Corp. (XOM) by cutting in half a $5 billion jury award for punitiv
e damages.
An Anchorage jury awarded punitive damages, the nation's largest at the time, to 34,000 fisherman and other Alaskans in 1994 in one of the longest-running, non-criminal legal disputes in the nation. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered, for the third time, the Anchorage court to reduce the award saying it was unconstituitionally excessive.
At this point those involved in the litigation just want to get it over with illustrated in this quote from an MSNBC.com article, “Exxon wins on this one because they’ve literally worn people out and I think most people just want to get this over with," said Frank Mullen, board member of United Cook Inlet Drift Association.
The disaster was caused by Joseph Hazelwood, the captain of the Valdez, who caused the tanker to run aground onto a reef while drunk. It was the worst oil spill in U.S. History and prompted Congress to pass a law banning single-hulled tankers like the Valdez from domestic waters by 2015.
A new Supreme Court ruling that says punitive damages usually could not be more than nine times general damages whereas the Anchorage jury awarded punitive damages that were 17 times the $287 million awarded in general damages.
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