Chevron Ecuador lawyer Steve Donziger: statement that destroys case

Steven Donziger is the central lawyer who has spearheaded the alleged environmental damage lawsuit against Chevron by Ecuador.

He's also one of the central figures of the movie Crude, which claims to document the case against Chevron in Ecuador. But video that was removed from the final cut of crude reveals a Donziger willing to do almost anything to "get the money" from an oil company.

This space has long held that Donziger was as interested in making billions for himself, as anything else.



And while Donziger claims to represent the "indigenous people of Ecuador," the reality, given his working relationship with the President of Ecuador Rafael Correa, as well as the fact that Ecuador's own attorney general has said that Ecuador will receive "90 percent" of a damage award against Chevron, means the lawsuit really has little to do with the people of Ecuador.

Now, this statement Donziger made, which found its way into the movie Crude, before it was removed, proves it. While this news has been out there, this blogger reiterates it in a call for the actual video to be shown to the public.

What Donziger said is from the document, “Chevron Corporation’s Memorandum of Law in Support of Motion for a Preservation Order, and to supplement and enforce the subpoenas,” filed by Chevron’s lawyer, Randy Mastro, with Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, and obtained via Bob McCarty, a fellow blogger who's followed the Chevron Ecuador case. You can download it here, but this is what Donziger said:

"Hold on a second, you know, this is Ecuador. . . . You can say whatever you want
and at the end of the day, there's a thousand people around the courthouse, you're going to get what you want. Sorry, but it’s true. Because at the end of the day, this is all for the Court just a bunch of smoke and mirrors and bullshit. It really is. We have enough, to get money, to win."

According to the filing, Donziger made the statement "during a meeting with Plaintiffs’ U.S. environmental consultants Charles Champ, Ann Maest, and Dick Kamp, after Maest tells him, point blank, that they need evidence of groundwater contamination, because Plaintiffs did not submit any and 'right now all the reports are saying it’s just at the pits and the stations and nothing has spread anywhere at all.'" In other words, the groundwater contamination Donziger claims Chevron was responsible for, never occurred. Donziger's lawyers were concerned that they lacked evidence to back his claim, thus Donziger statement that, essentially, issuing "bullshit" would win the case for them.

The rest of the document reports Donziger made this statement on camera: "There’s another point I got to make . . . with these guys, but I can't get this on camera." At that point, the filing reads, the camera's turned off.

Crude Movie Did Not Tell The Whole Story

Now we can see why Crude Movie Director Joseph Berlinger fought to keep the footage taken out of the movie from being seen - it would have destroyed his attempt to paint Chevron in a bad light and made Donziger look like a hero.

The bottom line here, for years, has been that Donziger's not a hero and Ecuador itself is responsible for the oil spills and environmental damage that has occurred since Chevron's departure.  Berlinger should show every part of footage from his movie, so everyone can see the truth.

Going back to urban planning school, my issue with some under-developed nations like Ecuador has been that they don't take steps to make life better for their poorest people. They allow them to be exploited by people like Steven Donziger for their own personal gain.