Chevron finds Ecuador geologist Richard Cabrera committed fraud in lawsuit

New York, NY - Richard Cabrera, the Ecuador economist / geologist who's name has appeared in this space as recently as February of 2010, is back in the news again. Chevron, who's battling a lawsuit filed by Ecuador (but with the claim that it was issued by the indigenous people of Ecuador) claims to have found evidence that Cabrera was working with the real plaintiffs who filed the lawsuit. A suit that charges Chevron failed to do environmental cleanup in that country during its oil operations that ended 18 years ago. Those oil facilities were turned over to the Ecuador-run company called Petroecuador.

According to Reuters, Chevron vice president and general counsel Hewitt Pate said "This direct evidence of fraud and ex parte contacts further demonstrates the illegitimacy of the fictitious $27 billion number the plaintiffs' lawyers have created for the purpose of extracting money from Chevron and its shareholders. Despite years of denial by Mr. Cabrera and the plaintiffs' lawyers, one of their own consulting firms has now admitted in a U.S. court proceeding that they dealt directly with Mr. Cabrera. We also now know that Cabrera himself was previously employed by one of the plaintiffs' lawyers in another case prior to being appointed in Lago Agrio and that he never disclosed that fact to Chevron or the Lago Agrio court."

Richard Cabrera is the same person mentioned in this blog as being a potential winner of a portion of any damage award that would come from Chevron if it lost the case against Ecuador. Karen Hinton, the communications representative for the Amazon Defense Coalition, which is a fiscal non-profit front company for the plaintiffs and is not actually defending the Amazon, said "Since evidence at trial has indisputably shown Chevron is responsible for extensive contamination, the company has done everything within its power to attack the judicial process at its last hope of evading liability."

The trouble with Hinton's claim is much of the so-called evidence is questionable at best. There have been 118 oil spills in Ecuador since Chevron left 18 years ago. All of the so-called evidence was actually produced by Petroecuador. The other problem is that The Amazon Defense Coalition has never sued Ecuador, leaving open the perception in this space that they're working with Ecuador and adding to the fact that Ecuador's party to the lawsuit.