Although such awards are routinely reduced before the cases are settled, the study listed huge settlements reached in recent years, including one for $50.1 million in Manhattan in 2002 and another for $10.6 million in Brooklyn in 2000.

Protected trees are towering giants of the forest attaining a height of up to 50 metres and a diameter of 220 cm- though height is routinely reduced by lightning strike.

Mr. Martin of the E.P.A. said that while the "new Administration has a serious commitment to enforce programs," audits by his office of many enforcement programs showed penalties were routinely reduced.

Loss of DNA repair pathways One example of a functional category that is routinely reduced in small-genome bacteria is that consisting of genes for DNA repair and recombination.

But Mr. Turso said that the collection of water samples is routinely reduced at the end of each month, after state required minimum numbers of samples have been gathered.

A New Jersey judge plans to conduct a personal study into whether the late Nicholas L. Bissell Jr., during his years as Somerset County Prosecutor, routinely reduced charges against major drug dealers who had surrendered cash or property to his office after their arrests.

Juries are not told about the $20,000 cap, which was instituted in 1971, and jury verdicts exceeding that amount against churches, colleges, hospitals and other charities are routinely reduced to that sum by trial judges and appeals courts.

Instead, since Murray was convicted of a non-violent felony, he'll instead be transferred to a county jail, where sentences are routinely reduced.

And misdemeanor arrests are routinely reduced to what amounts to the status of traffic tickets, leaving many crack buyers with no criminal record at all.