eau de porneau.

Appeals Panel Cuts Award in Valdez Spill by Exxon - New York Times

A majority of a three-judge panel said the company’s negligent conduct, while “particularly egregious,” had not been intentional and had not warranted the maximum financial penalty that a lower court imposed.

The panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, split on applying legal precedents to the company responsible for the worst oil spill in United States history. It cut the award for punitive damages to $2.5 billion.

In the decision, the majority wrote, “Exxon’s reckless misconduct in placing a known relapsed alcoholic in command of a supertanker, loaded with millions of barrels of oil, to navigate the pristine and resource abundant waters of Prince William Sound, was reckless and warrants severe sanctions.”

“The misconduct did not, however, warrant sanctions at the highest range allowable,” the ruling added.

Wait a second. This is one of those odd occurrences where an event does not seem to have any correlation with the events leading up to it. A company puts a relapsed alcoholic behind the wheel of a boat carrying millions of barrels of oil, most definitely “negligible conduct,” in anyone’s definition of the word. What results is the worst oil spill in the history of the United States, and they don’t get the maximum fine allowable because the conduct “had not been intentional,”? Putting a drunk behind the wheel of a supertanker sounds pretty intentional to me.

By the way, they shouldn’t be getting any break. Something tells me they can afford to throw a bit of cash around.

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