When a federal judge ruled last year that trial lawyer Steven Donziger’s team engaged in fraud to win a multibillion-dollar environmental lawsuit against Chevron in Ecuador, both moral supporters and investors who funded the legal action began to bail. The specific evidence cited by the judge and the negative publicity was too much for backers such as Burford Capital and the Patton Boggs law firm, which renounced their involvement in the lawsuit. But not Amazon Watch, an environmental group dedicated to preserving the Amazon rainforests and fighting climate change that relies on celebrity donors such as actor and director Leonardo DiCaprio and billionaire philanthropist Tom Steyer to fund its global work. Read more>>
Last year Steven Donziger was found by a U.S. federal court to have violated federal racketeering laws, committing mail and wire fraud, money laundering, witness tampering and obstruction of justice. Despite the U.S. court finding that the $9.5 billion Ecuadorian judgment against Chevron is the product of fraud, bribery and extortion, Donziger and his team continue to repeat their distortions about the case hoping that their lies will become the truth. Unfortunately for Mr. Donziger, his associates and his few remaining supporters, the truth in this case has been proved and is undeniable. Read more>>
Kobre & Kim has won a third settlement against a litigation funding company for its client Chevron in the energy giant’s mammoth lawsuit with Ecuador over a fraudulent judgment relating to oil waste in the Amazon. Read more>>
It’s time to check back in on the attempts by New York attorney Steven Donziger and his environmental activist friends to shake down energy giant Chevron for billions of dollars. Unfortunately for Steve, the news continues to be bad without exception. Having been exposed as a racketeer under the auspices of RICO, the various groups who had invested money in the litigation in exchange for a percentage of the expected shakedown money continue to bail out. The latest is the British group Woodsford Litigation Funding Limited. Read more>>
Steven Donziger is either an unscrupulous lawyer who committed “egregious fraud” in his legal battle against Chevron, or he’s the target of a massive retaliation campaign by the oil giant. It depends on who you ask: an American judge, or Donziger and his allies. Read more>>
Steven Donziger, a lawyer who was charged with fabricating evidence, promising bribes and even ghostwriting critical court documents in order to win a $19 billion judgment against Chevron for polluting Ecuador’s rainforests, is now on the college speaking circuit and touring many of America’s most prestigious universities. Read more>>
Here, in a nutshell, are the real human rights lessons of Chevron in Ecuador, drawn from the jurists’ brief: “Advocates for human rights do not advance human rights by violating them.” Human rights “cannot be promoted through corrupt means.” And “corrupt means are apt to subvert even noble ends.” The nutshell in a nutshell is that ends don’t justify means. There’s really not much left to be said, other than citing the pertinent conventions to promote human rights and combat corruption. Read more>>
“If you repeat a lie a thousand times it becomes the truth.” That is the motto that Steven Donziger, the U.S. lawyer who orchestrated a fraud and extortion scheme to target Chevron through sham litigation in Ecuador, confided to a member of his Ecuadorian legal team. Since then, one of this country’s most respected trial court judges has found that Donziger violated federal racketeering laws by committing multiple acts of mail and wire fraud, attempted extortion, bribery of foreign officials, money laundering, witness tampering and obstruction of justice.
New York attorney Steven Donziger, in Ecuador, obtained a $19 billion judgment against Chevron in favor of 47 indigenous people from Ecuador’s backwoods to compensate them for oil exploration pollution. But that supposed “justice” was discovered to be injustice, the result of lying, bribery and fraud. While an unbelievable story for a movie, it is the truth as found by a respected New York federal judge. Here is how it was uncovered. Read more>>
Harvard University may be sending a none too subtle message regarding their feelings about capitalism and successful businesses in America. They are hosting a panel discussion event this weekend with the innocent sounding name, Insider perspectives and implications for the future of transnational corporate liability. On the surface that probably sounds about as interesting as watching paint dry, but one of the distinguished speakers on the panel is none other than Chevron Shakedown lawyer Steven Donziger, famous for being instrumental in trying to shake down the energy giant for billions of dollars. This is an effort which has since gone totally off the rails and seen the attorney hauled into court and found complicit in a vast conspiracy to defraud the company. What’s even more odd is that even though this campaign has been completely discredited, this is the second time Harvard has hosted him. Read more>>
It was on the same day that “Mad Men” announced that it would split its final season in half that arbitrators in Chevron v. Ecuador split their latest decision in half in 2013. Appropriately, the arbitrators’ sequel came last week, during the lead-up to the show’s final episodes. But unlike “Mad Men,” we know that the latest arbitral ruling ends with a cliffhanger. Herewith, a guide to the next season of the world’s longest-running legal dramedy, which debuts April 20 with the split-screen airing of the Chevron v. Donziger appeal and the Chevron v. Ecuador arbitration trial. Read more>>
The fallout continues from what is arguably the greatest legal fraud in history—the case against Chevron for allegedly polluting the Ecuador jungle. On Monday Chevron announced it has reached a settlement with James Russell DeLeon, a leading funder of the fraudulent lawsuit. Read more>>