Posted on: Friday, November 16, 2001

Editorial
Gas price lawsuit must be open to the public

It's clear that falling crude oil prices haven't saved Hawai'i motorists from paying the highest dollars for gasoline in the nation — around $2 a gallon at the pump.

There are any number of potential explanations for our high prices. But inevitably, some Hawai'i consumers end up suspecting they're the victims of gasoline price fixing.

While Mainland prices fluctuate according to market forces, Hawai'i's barely budge, despite the fact that we have our own refineries.

Hawai'i's oil companies say this is a complicated business. But we just want to know, who or what sets the price?

Hopefully, the answer will emerge in the state's $2 billion antitrust case against several major oil companies. The 1998 lawsuit against Chevron, Shell Oil, Tosco, Unocal, BHP, Tesoro and Texaco alleges they conspired to keep gasoline prices artificially high. BHP and Tesoro have since settled with the state for $15 million.

The case is set for trial in February 2002. The oil companies have consistently denied any wrongdoing.

As yet, though, a shortage of public information makes it nearly impossible to determine what is involved in our high prices.

At the request of the oil companies, reams of documents containing information about their costs, pricing practices and profit margins have been sealed since 1999. They insist the documents contain proprietary information.

Now, U.S. District Judge Samuel King wants them made public, and so do we.

After all, the trial is being held to protect the public, yet the evidence used on the public's behalf is being kept from us.

The oil companies themselves have acknowledged that Hawai'i consumers are stakeholders. They want the trial moved to the Mainland because they say Island jurors would benefit from an outcome that favored the state.

In the end, the state may or may not be able to successfully demonstrate its allegation of a price-fixing conspiracy. But we'll have a lot more confidence in the outcome if the evidence is unsealed and available to all.