https://twitter.com/SDonziger/status/1530267342915129348
@SDonziger
BREAKING: Even the pro-corporate magazine @Forbes
is questioning @Chevron
's unethical litigation tactics targeting me and Ecuadorian Indigenous peoples who won the historic $9.5b pollution judgment. "Chevron's plan: deny pollution and demonize Donziger."
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Courts Are Not A Weapon: How Corporations Like Chevron Use The Law To Get Their Way
Morgan SimonSenior Contributor
I write about money and social justice.
May 26, 2022,02:30pm EDT
In 2008, I attended Chevron’s CVX +1% annual meeting in Richmond, California, alongside indigenous activists from Ecuador concerned about their ownership of Texaco and the legacy of environmental destruction in Ecuador. I will never forget an Ecuadorian woman who went up to the mic during the public comment period, in front of perhaps 300 audience members and opened her shirt to reveal a shocking red rash all over her chest. She asked the CEO directly, to the best of my recollection, “Why do I and my children all have this rash? When will your company clean up the environmental damage it has caused?”
I carpooled with a group of people in a minivan, and parked in a parking lot across the street. We piled in for the long ride back to San Francisco and were in the process of getting our seatbelts on. We hadn’t even left the parking lot when cops pulled us over and promptly cited us for seatbelt violations.
A few months later, I received a $500 fine and the news that my license had even been suspended. This wasn’t exactly life-threatening, but it was certainly annoying. I was a passenger, not the driver…why suspend my license? While I cannot prove that the local cops were in cahoots with Chevron, it certainly seemed fishy that cops would take such an interest in seatbelt safety inside a parking lot, if not motivated by the “safety” of one of its largest taxpayers.
My story, however, is nothing compared to that of Steven Donzinger, the lawyer who stood up to Chevron’s environmental abuses in Ecuador and lost his personal freedom as a result. (My story of being sued by CoreCivic for $55M for defamation is perhaps a bit more comparable, but at least I have not lost my personal freedom). Both stories should be a cautionary tale for shareholders who think that corporate money should be focused on fulfilling a company’s mission, not prosecuting those who may challenge it.
The Steven Donzinger Story
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - MAY 10, 2021. Attorney Steven Donziger arrives for a court appearance at Daniel ... [+]
Steven Donziger has recently been released after more than two years under house arrest in Manhattan, following six months in jail.
- Collectively, it's the longest sentence for a misdemeanor ever in the US.
- The detention was linked to his decades-long battle with oil titan Chevron in which he won a $9.5 billion settlement against the company for its destruction of the Amazon AMZN +3.7% rainforest in Ecuador.
- That victory, nearly unparalleled in its scale and scope, prompted Chevron to shuffle assets out of Ecuador to avoid repaying the Indigenous Cofán people, whose lands had been poisoned by drilling and dumping. Chevron later brought its vast resources to bear, launching an extensive campaign against Donziger for his work.
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