Cheers!
Posted on 06/25/2008 12:37:05 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned the record $2.5 billion in punitive damages that Exxon Mobil Corp had been ordered to pay for the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska.
The nation's highest court ruled that the punitive damages should be limited to an amount equal to the total relevant compensatory damages of $507.5 million.
In the court's opinion, Justice David Souter concluded that the $2.5 billion in punitive damages was excessive under federal maritime law, and should be cut to the amount of actual harm.
By a 5-3 vote, the justices overturned a ruling by a U.S. Court of Appeals that had awarded the record punitive damages to about 32,000 commercial fishermen, Alaska natives, property owners and others harmed by the nation's worst tanker spill.
Soaring oil prices have propelled Exxon Mobil to previously unforeseen levels of profitability in recent years, posting earnings of $40.6 billion in 2007.
It took the company just under two days to bring in $2.5 billion in revenue during the first quarter of 2007.
The Exxon Valdez supertanker ran aground in Alaska's Prince William Sound in March 1989, spilling about 11 million gallons of crude oil.
The spill spread oil to more than 1,200 miles of coastline, closed fisheries and killed thousands of marine mammals and hundreds of thousands of sea birds.
A federal jury in Alaska awarded $5 billion in punitive damages in 1994. A federal judge later reduced the punitive damages to $4.5 billion, and the appeals court further cut it to $2.5 billion.
Exxon Mobil, the largest U.S. company by market capitalization, appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing it already has paid more than $3.5 billion for the spill.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
good.
This reminds me of “Waterworld”. Dennis Hopper keeps a picture of his hero aboard the old tanker. Don’t really know who he’s referring to except the hero’s name is “Joe” until the picture of the sinking of the tanker. The ship’s butt is in the air as it sinks with the name “Exxon Valdez”. Then the audience realizes it was Joe Hazelwood, the skipper.
See, if Exxon was the local Qwickie mart, they would have been forced to pay, but those rules do not apply to them, they will of course apply for additional appeals, and of course, their request will be granted, and 10 more years will go by...
One scale of justice for the wealthy, then another one for everyone else, that is my problem with this one, it’s been twenty years, and not a cent has been paid, “Joe Average”
would have been liquidated on the courthouse steps two decades ago...
It took the company just under two days to bring in $2.5 billion in revenue during the first quarter of 2007.
And this is relevant to the court case how?
Reuters wouldn't be putting unrelated info into a news story to attack Exxon would it? No...
“It took the company just under two days to bring in $2.5 billion in revenue during the first quarter of 2007. “
This is a complete meaningless statement, standing on it’s own like they have it.
Drudge has: GUN RIGHT FIGHT: TOMORROW...
That is the big one.
“It took the company just under two days to bring in $2.5 billion in revenue during the first quarter of 2007.”
Sigh, what does revenue have to do with income?
Very deceptive, but maybe the author is just ignorant.
Some of these tyrants in black robes want to control every aspect of life in the US.
If they would have broadly ruled on general punitive damages correctly in the first place, this case would have been settled [favoring Exxon] in lower courts years ago.
But that would have put a dent in the income of trial lawyers, and donations to the DNC.
Well after the botched early attempts at ‘cleanup’ by the local do-gooders and assorted volunteers from all about; a review was done by some outside biologists of the beaches and they determined that far greater damage was done by the steam cleaning operations than by the spilled oil.
The birds suffered the most killoff I suppose but in the scheme of things nature did the majority of the work as the tidal and storm action turned the slick into tar balls much as it does with natural seeps and those that wash ashore get covered with dirt and fall back to the sea.
Size matters....
Not True, Exxon has paid out over $3 BILLION in direct damages (Travel to Prince William Sound and look for all the "Spillionairs" in their new fishing boats etc.)
This settlement is for punitive damages only.
What are you talking about?
Exxon paid over a billion dollars to clean up the spill.
They paid actual damages of over $500 million.
These are punitive damages and do nothing to reflect any actual or perceived losses. It’s all about punishing Enron for something that rose out of the actions of a few. The court even blamed the US Coast Guard for not controlling the shipping lanes.
This is just an extended effort to get more $,$$$,$$$,$$$ out of Enron and enrich a legion of trial lawyers.
Drudge has: GUN RIGHT FIGHT: TOMORROW...
That is the big one.
I went to grade school in Ocean View, Virginia (very near the US Naval base at Norfolk) from 1941 till 1946, while German submarines were sinking numerous tankers forming in convoys off Virginia Beach, about thirty miles from Ocean View.
Oil from those torpedod tankers made its way into Chesapeake Bay and onto the beach at Ocean View.
Oil is hydrocarbon made from organic life forms, and — over a short period of time, perhaps a year — nature took care of that spilled oil. Throughout WW-II, swimmers at Ocean View beach were generally bothered more by jellyfish than oil.
I went on an Alaskan cruise about 5 years ago and we stopped in Valdez for a half a day. It was the most beautiful spot on our cruise. There was absolutely no sign of any environmental disaster.
We don’t want to let oil tankers leak all over the place, but one spill, even a big spill, isn’t the end of the world.
There is zero perspective in the environmental wacko brain.
This ruling is good news.
More support among the SC for Exxon than justice for kids getting raped. At least by a couple.
And that is the point, “Size matters” indeed it does, and for me, it’s not the money, it’s the idea that Exxon has access to a different justice system then “Joe Average” does.
I don’t like the thought that Exxon or any major corporation has access to a different court system and set of laws, this is the second or third time Exxon has made it to the SCOTUS on the Valdez spill.
EXACTLY!!! Freakin' MSM airheads, sheeesh...
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