Friday, September 4: Supreme Court of Canada to decide fate of US$9.5B pollution judgment against Chevron

Supreme Court of Canada to decide fate of US$9.5B pollution judgment against Chevron on Sept. 4 on Sept. 4 by Drew Hasselback, August 28, 2015, Financial Post
A court in the Latin American country in 2011 found Chevron liable for about three decades of soil and water pollution near oil wells that ruined the health and livelihoods of Amazon rain forest dwellers.

The Supreme Court of Canada will next Friday decide whether plaintiffs from Ecuador can seek to enforce a US$9.5-billion pollution judgment against Chevron’s assets in Canada.

The Supreme Court last December heard oral arguments in the case but reserved its decision.

Plaintiffs won more than $9-billion in a 2011 judgment issued by an Ecuadoran court. Since that decision, lawyers for the oil company have obtained a ruling in U.S. federal court finding that the Ecuadorian judgment was obtained by fraud. A U.S. appellate court has heard oral arguments in an appeal of that ruling but reserved its decision.

Counsel for the plaintiffs hired Toronto lawyer Alan Lenczner to file the Ecuadoran judgment with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice so the plaintiffs could begin collection proceedings against Chevron’s Canadian assets. Chevron successfully quashed that action at the motion stage in May 2013, but the Ontario Court of Appeal overturned the motion decision in December 2013, setting the stage for the appeal to the SCC.

The decision in Chevron Corporation v. Daniel Carlos Lusitande Yaiguaje will be released Sept. 4 at 9:45 a.m.

[Refer also to:

Top Ten List of Chevron’s Most Outrageous Comments On Its Ecuador Disaster:

“There is danger is paying too much attention to fairness.”

Chevron Lawyer Clarke Hunter to the Supreme Court of Canada, December 11, 2014.

“We can’t let little countries screw around with big companies like this.”

Chevron lobbyist in Washington, D.C. quoted anonymously by Michael Isikoff in Newsweek magazine, August 4, 2008.

“We will fight until hell freezes over — and then skate it out on the ice.”

Chevron General Counsel Charles James in a speech in 2008 to law students at the University of California, Berkeley.

“I have make-up on, and there’s naturally occurring oil on my face. Doesn’t mean that I’m going to get sick from it.”

Chevron lawyer Sylvia Garrigo responding to a question from Scott Pelley of 60 Minutes about the contamination from the company’s abandoned waste pits in Ecuador in a segment that aired on May 3, 2009. ]

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