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Related: About this forumSupreme Court refuses to block Chevron's $18.2 billion verdict for pollution in Ecuador
Supreme Court refuses to block Chevron's $18.2 billion verdict for pollution in Ecuador
Reuters mercurynews.com
Posted: 10/09/2012 11:57:40 AM PDT
October 9, 2012 6:59 PM GMTUpdated: 10/09/2012 11:57:41 AM PDT
WASHINGTON -- Chevron on Tuesday lost a U.S. Supreme Court bid to block an $18.2 billion Ecuadorian judgment against the San Ramon oil company in a case over pollution in the Amazon jungle.
A lower court threw out an injunction blocking enforcement of the judgment in January. Chevron appealed to the Supreme Court, which rejected the appeal without explanation.
The decision is the latest in a nearly two-decade conflict between Chevron and residents of Ecuador's Lago Agrio region over claims that Texaco, bought by Chevron in 2001, contaminated the area from 1964 to 1992. The battle has spawned litigation in numerous courts both inside and outside the United States.
Oil companies are watching the case closely because it may affect other cases accusing companies of polluting the areas where they operate.
More:
http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_21732872/supreme-court-refuses-block-chevrons-18-2-billion?source=rss
Demeter
(85,373 posts)The US Supreme Court is only supreme in the US.
Peace Patriot
(24,010 posts)It reminds me of ES&S gobbling up Diebold, actually.*
Texaco gets themselves a great big stinking liability in Ecuador (toxic oil pollution over an area of rainforest the size of Rhode Island), and Chevron gobbles them up with a view to shedding the liability. The case was in court in the U.S. and Chevron moved it to Ecuador, because they thought they could control the courts in Ecuador. The U.S. judge made them promise to pay up if they lost their case in Ecuador and agreed to the change of venue. But, lo and behold--despite all the legal shenanigans and "dirty tricks" of batteries of the highest paid lawyers in the world--and despite the poverty of their victims, they lost the case. Now, of course--because they couldn't rig the courts in Ecuador--they have reniged on their promise to pay any judgement against them in Ecuador.
The Indigenous tribes whose lives and health were ruined did not give up. It's been almost two decades and they're still trying to get their health care covered and the spills cleaned up (as far as possible--it's a disaster, really).
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*(ES&S--a corporation with far right connections that would make your hair stand on end--thus got themselves a 70% monopoly over the 'TRADE SECRET' code voting systems in the U.S. And, believe me, they have used that illicit power over voting results and will do so again. And Diebold's notoriety has been buried, and our people thus put to sleep about the gravest menace that our democracy has ever faced.)