Reply #9: Dear Mr. President: CBS Evening News: Exxon Valdez Oil Spill: 20 Years Later

[Zorra]

CBS Evening News: Examining How One Alaska Community Is Coping With Disaster’s Lingering Economic Consequences
By Byron Pitts

Back in 1989, Exxon executives, including Don Cornett, promised to take care of everyone affected by the spill.
snip---
In total, Exxon spent more than $3.8 billion in clean up costs, fines and compensation. But in 1994, an Anchorage jury found Exxon acted recklessly and awarded victims of the spill $5 billion in punitive damages. An appeals court later cut that award in half.

But after nearly 15 years in appeals, the case finally reached the U.S. Supreme Court last year. The justices reduced that $2.5 billion in punitive damages to just more than $507 million.
snip---
“I think that's been Exxon's strategy every step of the way - to wear everybody down,” says Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska. "They've succeeded in fatiguing those who were entitled to this compensation."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/02/02/eveningnews/main4769329.shtml

Never, ever trust an oil company.

And how about those 5 America hating fascist/corporatists on the Supreme Court, huh? Sheds more light on why the SCOTUS appointed Bu*h to the Presidency in 2000 - to insure that fascists would continue to control the SCOTUS and keep the world safe for Corporatism.

Supreme Court drastically cuts payouts for plaintiffs in Exxon Valdez oil spill

Hopes of fishermen throughout Washington and Alaska were sunk Wednesday when the Supreme Court slashed the amount of punitive damages that Exxon must pay for the epic Exxon Valdez oil spill nearly two decades ago.

The high court, in a 5-3 decision, found that punitive damages could not be larger than the compensatory damages for actual losses from the spill, which totaled $507.5 million.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008018035_exxon26m.html