Judge in Chevron Case Declines to Reject Award

Judge in Chevron Case Declines to Reject Award by Bloomberg News, July 31, 2012, The New York Times
The Chevron Corporation failed on Tuesday to persuade a federal judge in New York to find an $18.2 billion judgment by an Ecuadorean court unenforceable, but the judge left an injunction against the award in place pending further litigation. The judge, Lewis A. Kaplan of United States District Court in Manhattan, declined to rule on Chevron’s request, saying it remained to be seen whether the judgment was based on fraudulent evidence. The oil company is suing lawyers for Ecuadorean plaintiffs who claim Chevron is responsible for pollution in the Amazon rain forest, contending that they fabricated evidence in the case in violation of racketeering laws. … Karen Hinton, a spokeswoman for the Ecuadorean plaintiffs, called Judge Kaplan’s decision a setback for Chevron. “Judge Kaplan’s refusal to rule that the Ecuador judgment is unenforceable due to Chevron’s fabricated fraud charges is consistent with the unanimous rulings of appellate courts in the United States and Ecuador that Kaplan has no legal authority to block enforcement of the Ecuador judgment,” Ms. Hinton said in an e-mailed statement.

This entry was posted in Global Frac News, Other Legal. Bookmark the permalink.