Alaskans sent reeling

Friday, June 27, 2008 | 2:09 a.m.

Exxon Mobil Corp. is having a great year, thanks to record oil profits and a Congress too timid to do anything about it. The company must be leading a charmed life because it can now add the U.S. Supreme Court to its party invitation list. The high court, in its finite wisdom, saved the company $2 billion Wednesday in a split decision involving the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker disaster off the Alaska coast.

The spill of nearly 11 million gallons of oil into pristine Prince William Sound, an accident that could have been avoided, disrupted the lives of thousands of Alaskans who earned a living in the fishing, cannery and tourism industries, and destroyed large populations of birds and marine mammals. It was arguably the greatest environmental disaster in U.S. history. The incident was so massive in scale that nearly 33,000 Alaskans sued Exxon for economic and punitive damages.

The plaintiffs had received $507.5 million in economic compensation from Exxon, but the Supreme Court lowered punitive damages from the $2.5 billion awarded by a federal appellate court to no more than $507.5 million. In arguing that the punitive damages could not exceed the economic compensation, the court effectively lowered the punitive awards to each plaintiff from $75,000 to $15,000.

Considering the devastation, Exxon Mobil is getting off too easily. It can go about its business, raking in obscene profits, while thousands of Alaskans continue to pick up the shattered pieces of their lives nearly 20 years later. It is one thing for a jury to go overboard when it comes to granting millions of dollars in damages for pain and suffering to individual plaintiffs. It is quite a different matter when a powerful corporation is allowed to get away with a paltry $15,000 per plaintiff. It must be nice to be a big oil company that gets all the breaks from our judicial and legislative branches of government. Imagine a time when the breaks go to the little guy. We can only dream.