WASHINGTON AP – The SupremeCourt on Monday agreed to decide whether Exxon Mobil Corp. should pay $2.5 billion in punitive damages in connection with the huge Exxon Valdez oil spill that fouled more than 1,200 miles of Alaskan coastline in 1989.

The high court stepped into the long-running battle over the damages that Exxon Mobil owes in the spillage of 11 million gallons of oil into Alaska’s Prince William Sound, the worst oil spill in U.S. history.