HAZELWOOD TRIAL BEGINS TODAY

By DON HUNTER
Daily News reporter

ANCHORAGE- The outrage and passion unleashed by the nation's largest oil spill settle into an Anchorage courtroom today in a trial that will determine if Capt. Joe Hazelwood or anyone else answers for the wreck of the Exxon Valdez.

The growing sea of muck that leaked from the Valdez last March into Prince William Sound ignited congressional hearings, boycotts of Exxon products and protests from Homer to Hollywood. Hazelwood's trial has drawn reporters from across the country.

Hazelwood, the captain of the Exxon Valdez until he was fired after the grounding, is the only person criminally charged as a result of the spill. He faces one felony count of criminal mischief and three misdemeanor charges accusing him of operating a water craft while intoxicated, reckless endangerment, and negligent discharge of oil. If convicted, he could be sentenced to seven years in prison and fined more than $60,000.

The issues in the case are simple and relatively straightforward: Was Hazelwood drunk? Was he reckless? But, with a slew of expert witnesses in the wings, the issues aren't likely to stay simple.

Prosecutors will try to convince jurors that Hazelwood was too drunk to legally command his vessel, that he left his ship in the charge of an unqualified third mate, and that he risked capsizing the vessel when he tried to drive her off the reef after the grounding.

The defense claims Hazelwood is innocent, a fallguy picked to take the rap for a massively destructive oil spill for which Exxon, the state and the U.S. Coast Guard share responsibility.

Defense attorney Dick Madson said Hazelwood will argue he was not drunk and that the state has no evidence he was, that his decision to leave Third Mate Gregory Cousins in charge during a critical course change was reasonable, and that Hazelwood was trying to hold the Valdez on the reef after the grounding, not float her free.

That debate won't start for days. Pretrial hearings and jury selection are expected to take at least a week.

Most of the details of the grounding have been uncovered by months of investigations by state and federal agencies. The trial should divulge some important new information: Why did it take more than 20 minutes for the crew of the Valdez to advise the U.S. Coast Guard the vessel was aground on Bligh Reef? What happened when Hazelwood returned to the bridge and found his ship aground?

The voyage started routinely enough at about 9 p.m. March 23. About 13 miles out from the terminal, Ed Murphy, a local harbor pilot whose job was to pilot the vessel through the Valdez Narrows, got off and the vessel continued under Hazelwood's command. At about 11:30 p.m., Hazelwood radioed the Coast Guard's Vessel Traffic Center to say he was changing course to avoid ice in the outbound tanker lane. After putting the ship on a course that would eventually intersect a reef and two islands, Hazelwood ordered the ship on automatic pilot and left the bridge in charge of his third mate.

Hazelwood ordered Cousins to execute a turn when the ship reached a Busby Island marker. In testimony at National Transportation Safety Board hearings in Anchorage last spring, Cousins said the Valdez came in sight of the Busby Island light at 11:55 p.m., and that he ordered the turn within a minute. However, an automatic reading of the ship's compass heading showed the turn didn't begin until about 12:01 a.m.

Minutes later, the Valdez plowed into Bligh Reef.

Hazelwood returned to the bridge; he notified the Coast Guard "we've fetched up hard aground" at 12:26 a.m.

According to tape recordings of his conversations with Coast Guard Commander Steve McCall in the first hour after the Valdez ran aground, Hazelwood tried to drive the ship off the reef, a maneuver that could have caused it to roll over.

Hazelwood's attorneys claim the captain was attempting to do just the opposite that he gunned her engines to hold the vessel on the reef. According to a recent interview in Life magazine, McCall now supports that claim.

That version of the event is contradicted, however, by the taperecorded exchanges between the two on the night of the disaster. Even with McCall's support, the defense still must find a way to refute the recording.

In one exchange shortly after 1 a.m., for example, Hazelwood tells McCall, ". . . we're working our way off the reef. We've, uh, the vessel has been holed and we're ascertaining right now, we're trying just to get her off the reef and we'll get back to you as soon as we can . . . "

McCall urges Hazelwood to "take it slow and easy," and asks for information on the tanker's stability.

"OK," Hazelwood says, "we're in pretty good shape right now, stabilitywise, and ah trying to extract her off the shoal here . . . once we get under way, I'll let you know . . ."

While the defense appears to have its work cut out for it on the recklessness issue, prosecutors have an uphill battle proving Hazelwood was drunk at the time of the grounding.

Hazelwood had a history of drunkdriving arrests and was seen drinking in the town of Valdez on March 23 before departing the port. The Coast Guard officer sent to the Valdez to interview Hazelwood after the grounding said he detected a strong odor of alcohol on Hazelwood's breath.

But no one crew members or investigators said Hazelwood looked or acted drunk aboard the Valdez, and nine hours elapsed before a Coast Guard investigator took a sample of his blood. Tests of the sample showed Hazelwood with a blood alcohol count of about .06, less than the .10 level considered too drunk to drive a car under state law, but more than the .04 level federal laws say is the maximum for people operating marine vessels.

The defense argues that a blood test taken so long after the event is meaningless, and that the state and federal agents didn't properly preserve the blood, anyway.

"And, even if he was drunk," said Dick Madson, one of Hazelwood's attorneys, "was it a causative factor? . . . You can give a perfectly good, valid order whether drunk or sober . . . (although) we're not conceding in the slightest that anybody was drunk."

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