It’s been twenty years since the Exxon Valdez veered off course and ran onto rocks, spilling 11-million barrels of crude oil into Alaska’s Prince William Sound. Now, after dodging its responsibility to those it injured for fully two decades with appeal upon appeal, Exxon has reached the end of the litigation line, the US Supreme Court.

On appeal is the jury award of $5-billion in punitive damages which the company is trying to have the court set aside entirely or at least reduce.

Twenty years. That sounds like a litigation case in India, not a modern, Western nation.

Twenty years that have seen the deaths of nearly twenty per cent of the fishermen, cannery workers, native Alaskans and others who prevailed in the suit. Six thousand of them, in total, haven’t lived to see Exxon finally run to ground.

Exxon’s best line of defence, ironically, lies in 2oo-year old maritime case law concerning a shipowner’s liability where the crew, once at sea, turns privateer. Hmm – Exxon relying on a piracy case, sounds about right, eh?

It remains to be seen now whether Exxon has hit a wall or sailed into a safe harbour – the Supreme Court dominated by rightwing judges of the likes of Roberts and Scalia. A huge corporate defendant couldn’t have asked for more.