Fall Guy or Villain?

By Paul A. Witteman/Anchorage

From his room at the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage, Joe Hazelwood has an unimpeded view of ice-choked Cook Inlet and the snowy peaks of the Alaska Range looming 100 miles to the north. But across the street in Courtroom C of Alaska Superior Court, where the defrocked skipper of the Exxon Valdez is trying to sort out his legal future, the outlook is murky.

For the past three weeks Hazelwood has been on trial for his role in the grounding of the tanker last March. If convicted of criminal mischief and recklessly creating a risk of property damage, he faces seven years in prison and $61,000 in fines.

The central question is whether one person can be singled out for blame in the worst oil spill in U.S. history. The state believes so, basing its case on the tenet that a ship's captain is ultimately responsible for his vessel. Hazelwood's history of alcohol abuse has not helped his credibility. Nor has the fact that he left the bridge in the critical minutes before the accident. Hazelwood's defense is nonetheless trying, as it wades through a witness list loaded with 112 names, to persuade the jury that the captain was a scapegoat. Says Michael Chalos, a defense lawyer who was a college mate of Hazelwood's: "We know it's an uphill battle, considering the pretrial publicity."

Hazelwood's lawyers contend that the Coast Guard, which has the responsibility to monitor ships in Prince William Sound, failed to warn the Exxon Valdez before it went aground. They also argue that Third Mate Gregory Cousins, who was in charge of the Valdez when the accident took place, was qualified to run the ship in the captain's absence. Finally, they may try to cast doubt on the widely held belief that Hazelwood was drunk at the time.

Last week Cousins and Helmsman Robert Kagan testified. Both maintained that they had followed Hazelwood's orders to steer the ship back into an outgoing sea-lane from which it had been diverted to avoid floating ice. But Cousins charged that Kagan had failed to turn the helm sharply enough to bring the ship promptly to its new course, and that was why the Valdez plowed into a reef it should have missed by two miles. Chief Mate James Kunkel testified that before the accident he had warned Hazelwood that Kagan needed extra supervision and "practice in steering." On a 1985 voyage with Kagan, Kunkel said the seaman had trouble choosing the right paint and brush to paint a bulkhead.

As the trial began, Governor Steve Cowper released a report indicating that the spill is still very much on the mind of his state. A survey completed last fall asserted that up to 117 miles of coastline in Prince William Sound and along the Gulf of Alaska were still heavily or moderately oiled. The next comprehensive survey will not take place until March, when the cleansing effect of winter storms can first be measured. Exxon, which has spent $1.8 billion on the cleanup already and is negotiating a settlement with the U.S. Government that could cost the company an additional $500 million, says the state has overestimated the amount of pollution that remains.

Curiously, the money Exxon has spent on the cleanup may have nudged some Alaskans, if not the jury, to think more kindly of the former captain. Before the spill, depressed oil prices had put the state economy in a slump. The cleanup created thousands of jobs. Prosecutors are privately worried that the ex-skipper may be viewed more sympathetically these days. Says Ernie Piper, special assistant to the Governor: "People here are less willing to buy the notion that Hazelwood is the symbol of the spill."