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Gold/Mining/Energy : Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline
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To: Snowshoe who wrote (395)7/16/2008 12:31:43 PM
From: Kenneth Kirk  Read Replies (2) of 570
 
I just did a quick read of Exxon's brief. They make a technical argument, that the reviewing court was supposed to address interest in its decision and didn't, so therefore no interest can be awarded. This is based on one of the procedural rules which says that the reviewing court should address interest in its decision. If that holds up, it can be easily corrected, I expect, by the Ninth Circuit.

The other arguments are based on the idea that Exxon essentially won. They blame the plaintiffs for pushing for the high punitive award, most of which was overturned. This is based on the underlying idea of the interest itself as being punitive. However the main purpose of interest on judgments is to compensate plaintiffs for the lack of access to the money.

My gut feeling is that the courts won't want to let Exxon walk away paying no interest. After all it's been (if I remember my dates correctly) 19 years since the spill, and 14 since the original decision. There's a time value of money factor here that I don't think the courts will ignore.

It may, however, give Exxon an excuse to keep litigating and avoid paying even longer. If they don't like the judge's decision on this, they'll appeal, again, and probably not pay until they've exhausted all their appeals.
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