Chevron Ecuador Muddled By Petroecuador, Canadian, Foreign Oil Companies

Lost in the entire Chevron Ecuador PR and legal battles is a little known report that between 2002 and 2010, Petroecuador - the state-owned oil company that took over the oil fields owned by Texaco, just after that company was purchased by Chevron - was responsible for an estimated 1,415 "environmental accidents" according to the Ecuadorian newspaper El Universo.

The oil company operated in five oil fields - Shushufindi, Sacha, Auca, Lago Agrio, and Libertador - where the damage happened. There is no report that Petroecuador has completed environmental clean-up in those areas.

Locally, Petroecuador is seen as the real problem, even as the government, which effectively runs the media, has formed a public view against Chevron as well.

But lost in all of this, from fraudulently prepared reports, to intimidation of Ecuadorian judges, is the fact that the story of oil exploration in Ecuador is one of the actions of many companies, as Chevron has not been in operation since 1992, and Occidental Petroleum was the last American company to work in the nation until they were kicked out in 2007.

For example, little discussed is the role of Canadian oil companies in Ecuador. Firms like Ivanhoe Energy and Encana, which started operations in 1999.

Encana, like Chevron, has been the focus of a movie, this one called Between Midnight and the Rooster’s Crow. But what makes this interesting is that with Encana, Ivanhoe, Repsol-YPF from Spain, Occidental Petroleum, Teikoku from Japan, the Brazilian national oil company Petrobras, the French oil company Perenco, and now Andes Petroleum, a consortium of Chinese oil producers, it's impossible to argue that the Ecuador oil story is one between just Chevron and Petroecuador.

It also makes it all but impossible to claim that oil wells in Lago Agrio were only used by Chevron - the facts just don't support that claim.

Why?

Because Lago Agrio is where Andes Petroleum Co currently operates, and where Encana worked before the Chinese entered Ecuador, buying the rights and production facilities for $1.4 billion, where Chevron, again, left in 1992 and engaged in cleanup work through 1995. Moreover, several firms, including Petroecuador, have produced oil in Lago Agrio over that time through to today.

This is 2011.

What's lost on American activists is that oil funds an estimated 50 percent of Ecuador's national budget. That, coupled with the fact that Ecuador produces more oil than it needs for its economy, and you have a situation where many foreign companies, not just a few, want to and have produced oil in Ecuador, and a government that's still all too interested in courting them.

And that, as Ecuador becomes a socialist dictatorship, and the perfect environment for an uprising, very much like the one that happened in September, involving Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa and the Ecuador police, who kidnapped him.

Their concerns: maintaining their benefits admit budget cuts. Ecuador's fiscal situation's not going to make life nice there for a while.

Stay tuned.

Ecuador On Eve Of Control Of Media, Muzzling Of Journalists, Bloggers

As a five-year observer of the ongoing legal battle between Chevron and Ecuador, this blogger's come away with a view of Ecuador that it is more like an authoritarian dictatorship than the democratic socialist government it paints itself to be.

In that, it must be asserted that a fair trial for any American business firm would be impossible to achieve in Ecuador, when the public opinion is essentially influenced by the government through the media. An opinion that differs from the state can result in the capture of the media outlet by Ecuadorian President Raphael Correa's Adminstration.

On Saturday, May 7th, the petroleum and agrobusiness nation will take a giant step in that direction as it considers a 10-point law that will control media content - legislation that, while years in the making, rubber-stamps the media-muzzling practices of President Correa (in photo with members of the media who are nice to him).

And while reports are that the referendum has the popular support of the voting people, a recent survey revealed that only 16 percent actually knew the contents of it. The most controversial item in the proposed set of laws, is a "council to regulate content deemed violent, sexual, or discriminatory." And by content, it refers to media content.

Roque Planas of Americas explains that:

Correa regularly butts heads with the media; he vilifies them regularly in speeches, accusing them of bias and inaccuracy. "Our greatest rival in this plebiscite is not the opposition. Our biggest rivals are the media, who come up with a fresh scandal on a daily basis," Correa said last week.

But Correa really didn't need the upcoming Saturday vote to collect media outlets that produce messages he doesn't like. Just ask Ecuadorian business leader Joyce DeGinatta, who, in 2009, had her television program, which had been under government scrutiny, cancelled, and the network it was on taken by the Ecuadorian government. Here's the video, with English text, from CyberDenizen On YouTube:



And according to the Committee To Protect Journalists, this week, a Ecuadoran provincial radio reporter named Walter Vite Benítez was sentenced to one year in jail, and for critical comments he made about the mayor of the City of Esmeraldas, Ecuador.

To put it another way, Benitez was jailed for the same critical comments this blogger, and many columnists and journalists, have made about Oakland's Mayors, from Jerry Brown to Jean Quan.

And what did Benítez do? He referred to the Mayor by his title, without using his name, and had been critical of that town's overall government.

And in March, the Committee To Protect Journalists also reports that President Correa himself filed a defamation complaint against the newspaper El Universo and its three executives and opinion editor. And the result of this complaint could be to land them in jail and have to pay "hefty fines" - specifically three years in jail and $80 million.

Looks like Chevron's not the only organization Correa's trying to shake down. He's doing it to some of his own people.

And for...what?

Referring to Correa as what he's acting like: a dictator.

In a searing column dated February 6, 2011, and entitled "NO to the lies," Emilio Palacio, Eluniverso's opinion editor, calls Correa "the dicator" rather than using his name, and writes (using Google Translate)...

I understand that the Dictator (devout Christian man of peace) does not lose an opportunity to pardon criminals. Pardoned drug mules, sympathized with the murderers prisoners in the Littoral, asked citizens to stop stealing for no victims, he cultivated a friendship with squatters and became legislators, to who betrayed him. But Ecuador is a secular state where not allowed to use faith as a legal basis to exempt the criminals pay their debts. If I committed a crime, I demand that you prove me otherwise, do not expect any judicial pardon but due apologies...

What happens is that the dictator finally understood (or their attorneys did understand) that it has no way to prove the alleged crime of September 30 and everything was the result of an improvised script, in the midst of this rushing to hide the irresponsibility of the dictator to go to get into a barracks revolt, to open his shirt and yelling kill him, like a true fighter cachacascán that strives to show in a circus tent of a forgotten town.

Emilio Palacio is referring to Correa's actions of last year and during the police uprising of last September 30th that challenged the President, who was hit by a gas canister, and eventually resulted in the death of three people. Correa, who came out, supposedly to restore order, ended up trying to take his shirt off, and allegedly yelling for the directors of the uprising to kill him where he stood. Hence the reference to "to open his shirt and yelling kill him, like a true fighter cachacascán that strives to show in a circus tent of a forgotten town," in Palacio's column.

Here's the BBC video report, showing Correa grabbing to rip off his shirt and tie, and saying, basically, "here I am, kill me":



It's that person, President Rafael Correa, which Ecuador's about to give sweeping powers of media control to.

God bless the United States Of America.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador: Judge Lewis Kaplan Blocks Ecuador; Ecuador Judge Worked In Fear

From one perspective, this action could be seen as the result of pissing off a judge. U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan, of The Southern District Of New York, granted Chevron's motion for a preliminary injunction, barring the country (not the claimed Ecuador residents but the country itself is a party to the lawsuit) from collecting on a $8 billion Ecuadorian court judgement.

 While Ecuador may choose to ignore the American judge's ruling and go after whatever money it thinks it's owed, it does not mean other jurisdictions will agree with them. Moreover, Judge Kaplan's second opinion, issued just five month after his first one, where he hammered the plaintiffs for a fraudulent presentation, is enough to give any legal system pause.

Why?  The accusations of fraud, as well as the fact that the plaintiff's lawyers have not denied any of Kaplan's claims.  Indeed, the spokesperson points to Ecuadorean Judge Nicolas Zambrano's ruling and opinion. But how can anyone take his work seriously when there's evidence the first judge Nunez was "on the take" and ready to issue a judgement against Chevron in exchange for a taste of the award? And the person who replaced Nunez, Judge Ordonez, was also accused of a lack of impartiality; he was booted, too.

And who replaced him? Nicolas Zambrano.

That's right.

And a man under pressure to get Chevron, and who admitted "I never answer the telephone or my cellphone without seeing a registered incoming number, because it could be anyone calling to insult or threaten me." In other words, this man was working in fear.

Fear.

Can you imagine what would have happened to Zambrano if he ruled for Chevron?

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador: Steve Donziger Tries To Work U.S. Judge To Get Billions

There are reports that Steve Donziger, the now famous plaintiffs lawyer in the Chevron Ecuador case - yeah, the same one who took a back seat to new lawyers led by the Patton Boggs firm - is striking back at U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan, saying that Kaplan was biased against Chevron and that is why the New York Judge ruled to block collection of any damage award from an Ecuador court trial that many knew was fixed in Ecuador's favor to start with.   In the process Steve is essentially proving what Kaplan has charged Donziger with doing in Ecuador: namely working to bully the courts.

Donziger's trying to collect his money.   That's all.

The bottom line is that Donziger won a sham trial in Ecuador - a country known for its unequal distribution of income, corrupt government, and curtailment of human rights - and did so in a way that Kaplan said, and did so with evidence, was fraudulent, and now wants to collect his share of the billions he said he expected to make from this case years ago.

Here's a reminder:



What a laugh.

What gets me, and has spurred me to blog about this since late 2007 or so, is that Ecuador gets off scott free from having to change its culture in any real way. President Correa's still corrupt, still trying to make people think he's an environmentalist when he's not. The ruling political party that controls the courts is still in power and waiting for its handout from the Chevron ruling (good luck). Anyone who blogs a view that the President's acting like a thug gets jailed. And Petroecuador, Ecuador's state-owned oil producer is still getting away with major oil spills (some 15 in all) that it then blames on Chevron, even though the American Oil Company isn't even there and hasn't been in Ecuador since 1992. Oh, and there are people, some in the media, who actually believe that garbage!

If you hear someone defend Ecuador, ask them what they know about the country's terribly ran oil production system, corrupt courts, and abysmal human rights record. Then watch them talk; they'd have nothing to say.

Crazy.

CRUDE Movie: A Brief Primer For Viewers - Part One

If you're interested in seeing the movie CRUDE, which is about a "one of the largest and most controversial environmental lawsuits on the planet," it's a good idea to be informed of what you're not going to see in the film.

CRUDE is about the Chevron-Ecuador case, but it makes its subjects, trail lawyer Steven Donziger and his crew, look like David trying to slay the Goliath that is Chevron. But the real problem with CRUDE lay in the hours and hours of outtakes that show what Donziger and his people were really trying to do: fabricate a believable story and "fix" the Ecuador court to draw billions from the American Oil Company, all the while protecting Ecuador's oil company, Petroeucador, which has been damaging the very environment that was cleaned up by Chevron Texaco before it left in 1992.

The issue for this blogger goes all the way back to grad school at U.C. Berkeley, and how Third World countries, like Ecuador, trap petrodollars and keep them from their poorest citizens. Americans help in this by working deals that protect these countries, while placing American business in the almost unassailable role of "bad guy." In other words, the perception is that because American Business has money, they must be at fault for the problems in the Third World.

That perception clouds the truth, that greed and corruption hamper many Third World economic development efforts. CRUDE ads to that perception in the matter of Chevron Ecuador, but the American Legal System has cleared that problem up. Here's PointOfLaw.com quoting U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan:

The release of many hours of the outtakes has sent shockwaves through the nation's legal communities, primarily because the footage shows, with unflattering frankness, inappropriate, unethical and perhaps illegal conduct. In the film itself, Attorney Donziger brags of his ex parte contacts with the Ecuadorian judge, confessing that he would never be allowed to do such things in the United States, but, in Ecuador, everyone plays dirty. The outtakes support, in large part, Applicants' contentions of corruption in the judicial process. They show how nongovernmental organizations, labor organizations, community groups and others were organized by the Lago Agrio attorneys to place pressure on the new Ecuadorian government to push for a specific outcome in the litigation, and how the Ecuadorian government intervened in ongoing litigation.

And here's an outtake from CRUDE where Donziger talks about the need to "pressure," and use "intimidation," and "humiliation" against the Ecuador court; actions that are illegal for an American lawyer to do and could lead to disbarment:



And here's another one where Donziger says to the film crew "That was off the record," as he's talking about having Richard Cabrera, the "fake" environmental expert who came up with the damage claims of up to $100 billion, there. Also, one person talks of making "everything they do transparent," causing Donziger to chime in saying "No. Not everything we do." Witness:



There's a lot more. Visit http://www.youtube.com/TexacoEcuador to see the rest.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador: $8 Billion Award In Sham Case No Surprise

The Chevron Ecuador matter reached a new point today when the Ecuadorian court did what this space expected it to do: declare Chevron guilty of alleged environmental damage, even though Chevron has been out of the country in all ways since 1992.



This case has been a sham from the start, and a slap in America's face.

As explained in this space many times over the last three years or more, Ecuador itself has been a key party in this lawsuit. Moreover, lead lawyer Steven Donziger has admitted he expects to become a billionaire from the case. The only organization standing in his way is the Government of Ecuador itself, where its attorney general has said that it, and not Donziger, would collect 90 percent of any damage amount declared.

Meanwhile damage estimates that started at $16 billion then rose to $27 billion, then most recently $113 billion, were all based on a report that the media has sloppily reported as from a "Court appointed researcher" when it was really from a study prepared for the court by (drum roll please) Steven Donziger and his associates.

The misinformation around this case has served to throw a smoke screen around the fact that Ecuador has kicked out American oil companies and made room for foreign oil producers, all the while working to keep oil revenues (they call it nationalization) and float high-minded ideas about helping the poor of Ecuador, but doing nothing.

Meanwhile, President Rafael Correa sits as if he's really trying to alter the state of how oil's produced in Ecuador, when upon study it's obvious that the country's just interested in gaining more dollars for its wealthiest people. Indeed, the President's own brother has been fingered as being the negotiator for $700 million in oil production contracts with companies that would do business with him.

According to Reuters:

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa is fighting accusations by a government watchdog that he knew about $700 million in state contracts that the panel says were improperly awarded to his brother.

Correa denied the allegation made by a four-member committee he created in 2009 to examine the business dealings of his older brother and political nemesis, Fabricio, a conservative who has threatened to run against him in 2013.

According to a report handed to state anti-corruption authorities last week by the Citizens Oversight Committee, the older sibling secured a slew of state oil exploration and public works contracts that broke anti-nepotism laws.

Fabricio has denied wrongdoing in the matter.

Correa's brother is at odds with him but remains cordial. However, he's also involved with the same Ecuadorian political movement that includes President Correa's sister, who has also been fingered as the possible recipient of millions from any damage award from a case that would go against Chevron.

All of this came out during the period of time that Ecuador Judge Juan Nunez was accused of taking bribes to rule against Chevron. He was eventually replaced by another judge.

The signs point to Correa's relations and Ecuador trying to work a big payoff from an American oil company 20 years removed while foreign companies and the State-run Petroecuador have polluted the land and waters.

A sham case and a slap in America's face.

Stay tuned.

Oakland Zoo Names New Board Members Including Mark McClure

Just got this press release announcing the Oakland Zoo's new board members: Sebastian DiGrande, Daniel Boggan, Jr., Cassady Hudson, Mark McClure, Lora Tabor and Jim Wunderman. To them all, and to one of them, I say congratulations. To my friend amoung, them, Mark McClure (pictured in an Oakland Chamber photo), let me say not only congrats, but maybe this is a good time to get off the Ron Paul bandwagon, eh?

Just kidding, sorta.

But back to the Oakland Zoo.

The rep for the Board of the East Bay Zoological Society (EBZS) was good enough to send over full bios of all of the new board members, so here they are:

Jim Wunderman is the President and CEO of the Bay Area Council, a business-backed public policy organization. Since becoming CEO in 2004, Wunderman has significantly helped increase the council’s advocacy efforts. A couple of the accomplishments under his leadership include: expanding the reach of the Bay Area Council with the opening of its first overseas office in Shanghai, leading the coalition that passed SB 375, a comprehensive law that binds transportation and housing planning, and passing legislation to establish a statewide education data system, a crucial step in fixing education in California.

Prior to his work at the Bay Area Council, Wunderman’s career from 1984 to 2004 was split between both the private and public sectors. In addition to serving on the EBZS’s Foundation Board, Wunderman also serves on the boards of the Bridge Housing Corporation, Fisher Center for Real Estate & Urban Economics, The Keston Institute for Public Finance and Infrastructure, The Pew Charitable Trusts, Sierra Energy, and TMG Partners. Jim was a member of the Governor’s Adaptation Task Force and currently serves on the Transit Sustainability Project Steering Committee.

Sebastian DiGrande is a Partner and Managing Director at the Boston Consulting Group, a global management consulting firm and the world’s leading advisor on business strategy. DiGrande, who joined the group in 1996, is BGC Americas’ leader of the Technology, Media and Telecommunications Practice. He partners with clients in all sectors and regions to address their most critical challenges. In 2009, he provided pro bono services to the Zoo.

Before joining BGC, DiGrande worked as a product manager and major account executive for GTE. He earned his MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and a BS in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Daniel Boggan, Jr. most recently served as Chief of Staff for Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums in 2007. Prior to working for Mayor Dellums, Boggan assisted the municipal firm of Siebert, Branford & Shank Co. in business development from 2003 to 2006. He acted as Senior Vice President and COO for the NCAA from 1994 to 2003. He has also served as Vice Chancellor for Business Administration at the University of California, Berkeley and as Berkeley’s City Manager. Boggan is deeply committed to public service, and has served on the boards of many local and national organizations. He has been involved with the National Writing Project, the East Oakland Youth Development Foundation, the African American Experience Fund, the California Endowment, and is a lifetime member of both the NAACP and Black Coaches Association. In addition, Boggan serves on the board of directors for Clorox, Collective Brands, Inc. and Viad Corp. Boggan earned his BA at Albion College and his M.S.W. at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Cassady Hudson is a Senior Revenue and Royalty Analyst at Hands-On Mobile. She has been volunteering as a docent at the Oakland Zoo for the past ten years and recently completed two years as President of the Zoo’s Docent Council. She joins the EBZS as a Docent Representative. During her tenure as President of the Docent Council, Hudson has ensured council stayed within budget, mentored new docents, developed an annual docent evaluation program in compliance with Association of Zoos and Aquariums standards, and updated by-laws to improve tracking docent commitment.

Mark McClure is a partner at California Capital and Investment Group, a real estate brokerage and development firm based in Oakland, CA. He has worked on both residential and commercial development projects primarily in the City of Oakland.

Mark is proud to be a native Oaklander and has served the public both in appointed positions and on various public boards and community organizations of personal interest. His appointed positions include four years on the Oakland Planning Commission, which he chaired from 2004 to 2005. In September of 2005 Mark was appointed to the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC). Finally, He was appointed to the Port of Oakland Board of Commissioners in December of 2006 where he served as the First Vice-President until March of 2009.

Mark has also served on the Board of The Crucible, a non-profit educational collaboration of art, industry and community in West Oakland. Mark has supported Children's Fairyland by serving on their annual fundraising gala committee. Mark also served a member of the OakPAC Board, an organization that functions as the political action committee for the Oakland Chamber of Commerce. Additional, in February 2006, Mark was nominated to the Oakland 100 Club, a philanthropic organization that benefits the Oakland Boys and Girls Club. Currently Mark serves on the Board of the Oakland Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and on the Board of the Oakland Police Foundation.

Lora Tabor joined the East Bay Zoological Society Board in June 2010. Ms. Tabor is the General Manager, Corporate & Services HR, for Chevron Corporation in San Ramon, where she provides Human Resources support to Chevron’s Executives and Corporate staffs. She also manages the Human Resources Development Program for Chevron world-wide. In 2006, she returned to the Bay Area headquarters after two years in Cape Town, South Africa where she served Chevron Corporation as the Manager, Internal Total Remuneration. In that capacity, Ms. Tabor managed a global team of professionals developing policies, processes and tools for world-wide use, and coordinated benefit and compensation plans for over 100 countries. Ms. Tabor began her career as a Production Engineer with Gulf Oil & Chevron USA.

Tabor takes an active role with her children in Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts, and has coordinated the Chevron United Way Campaign. She holds a Chemical Engineering degree from the University of Pittsburgh, and lives in Oakland with her husband and children.

If you're wondering how one becomes a board member, the Oakland Zoo's Development Director, Emma Lee Twitchell explains that "Individuals interested in joining the Board may contact the Zoo or a Board member directly, or be recommended by one of the Board members. The process then involves meeting with the Nominating Committee, which makes recommendations to the Executive Committee, then a final confirmation/vote by Board members. The Nominating Committee looks closely at diversity and other criteria to help fill any specific needs of the Zoo based on skills, experience, community representation, etc."

Chevron Ecuador: Restraining Order Slapped On Plaintiffs By Judge

In an interesting development, according to Law. Com, U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan slapped a temporary restraining order on Ecuadorean plaintiffs, which by extension should include the Country of Ecuador itself, and the new law firm, Patton Boggs, hired to shield lead lawyer Steven Donziger, formerly of Kohn, Swift, and Graff.

Apparently, Judge Kaplan thinks the whole Ecuador case is a sham and since Ecuadorian courts are known to be corrupt, and the plaintiff's case has evidence on top of proof that Donziger was in bed with the Country of Ecuador, the Judge decided on his own to block any attempt they might make to come to America and collect a damage claim of whatever billions in damages Ecuador's court may come up with. (First it was $16 billion and then $27 billion, and the recently $100 billion, and all from cooked reports created by the plaintiffs, and not, as claimed, an independent research analysis.)

See, Chevron has zero assets in Ecuador. None.  It's not operated their since 1992, and to show you how misguided the paid advocates have been, the fields they point to claiming damage by Chevron, were actually fields that have been used, to this day, by the State-run oil company Petroecuador.   Moreover, there have been over 100 oil spills since Chevron left Ecuador.

The point is, Ecuador continues to pollute its land and exploit its poor, all while continuing to pretend as if it's America's fault.

Ecuador Signs Contracts With Foreign Oil Firms

Meanwhile, and while Ecuador has successfully eliminated American Oil Companies from production in that country since Occidental Petroleum was kicked out in 2007 and Chevron left in 1992. The country, as recently as January, signed brand new oil production contracts with seven foreign firms, not one American: Petrobellfrom Brazil, Tecpecuador, from Argentinia, and as Spanish Petrosud-Petroriva, Spanish-Argentine Repsol-YPF and Colombian Pegaso. In the new contracts, and as part of its move to nationalize oil, Ecuador will keep 100 percent of oil production profits, and while promises have been made to help Ecuador's poor, there's no evidence of programs in operation to make good on those claims.

Remember, Ecuador is a member of The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, having been reinstated in 2007, after a 15-year absence. The overall objective of OPEC is:

to coordinate and unify the petroleum policies of its Member Countries and ensure the stabilization of oil markets in order to secure an efficient, economic and regular supply of petroleum to consumers, a steady income to producers and a fair return on capital for those investing in the petroleum industry.

That "steady income" now comes to Ecuador, but its poor continue to suffer.

Sad.

Huff Post Shows Oil Glove From PetroEcuador Oil, Says It's Chevron

In a total freaking joke of a blog post, Joanna Zelman somehow managed to get the Huffington Post to allow her to post a totally fraudulent entry accusing American Oil Company Chevron of environmental damage to the tune of $100 billion.

 And their proof is a oil-stained glove that anyone who's paid close attention to this case knows comes from oil fields that are owned not by Chevron but by PetroEcuador, the state-owned oil company.

It's commonly known that only a fool would believe that Chevron or any American Oil Company would be responsible for such a high level of environmental damage. Chevron's not operated in Ecuador for almost 20 years. Over that time there have been well over 100 - YES 100 - oil spills, and as many as 118 by 2009, including several by PetroEcuador that have, for all practical purposes been covered up.

Why?

So Ecuador can continue its attempt to extort American Oil companies in an effort to maintain oil revenues for its rich, while exploiting and starving its poor. Everyone who knows this case knows that Ecuador's involved with it, and that the lead lawyer, Steven Donziger, has worked with the government of Ecuador as well as conspired to threaten judges and intimidate the court of Ecuador.

This Ecuadorian trial is a joke, but if you've got an ounce of sense, you're not laughing at all.  Ecuador's trying to get off scott free.  Shame.  Just a plain shame.

And shame on the Rainforest Action Network for helping the corrupt Ecuadorian effort.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador Plaintiff's Information Fraud Continues In 2011

Want an example of The Matrix? The Chevron Ecuador case. Just look at the cultural environment of information fraud that some so-called activists have created around the Chevron Ecuador issue. The lie is that American Oil Company Chevron polluted the Ecuadorian Amazon without cleaning it up between 1968 and 1992. The lie is that Chevron caused $27 billion of environmental damage to Ecuador. The lie is that Chevron is still operating in Ecuador.

Organizations like The Rainforest Action Network keep spreading that lie. They should try telling the truth. Of course, if they did, it would mean whatever funding they get would dry up in a heartbeat. But telling the truth would be a good start toward better community relations.

The truth is that Ecuador itself, and not "a group of Ecuadorians" as Justmeans.com reports, is behind the Chevron lawsuit. The truth is that Ecuador has recently stated that it, and not lead plaintiffs lawyer Steve Donziger, would collect 90 percent of any lawsuit award if Chevron lost the Ecuador case. The truth is that Steve Donziger himself admitted a few years ago that he would get rich from this case.

The fact is that, according to outtakes from the movie Crude, Donziger himself conspired to plan to intimidate the Ecuadorian court, considered issuing a threat to kill a judge, and said he had met with Rafael Correa, the President of Ecuador and the executives of Petroecuador, the state-owned oil company.

The fact is that under Correa, Ecuador has kicked out all American Oil Companies, and embarked on a plan of nationalization of the oil industry, even passing a law to take more revenues under certain conditions.

All of this, while Ecuador's poor stuffers. In Ecuador, the 20 percent of the nations wealthiest people own half the nations total income. And according to the CIA World Factbook, income distribution in Ecuador has gotten worse, not better, in the 2000s all the way up to 2009. In fact, it's so bad, it compares to that of Sub-Saharan countries.

Meanwhile, Chevron has not been active in Ecuador since 1992, yet the so-called activists have created The Matrix, where the truth is met with attack by minions who behave like controlled Androids.

God help them if they're ever released from The Matrix.  They may find the truth of The Real World hard to deal with, and want to crawl back into it.  

Chevron Ecuador: NY Times Responds To Bias Claim, Says Plaintiffs Erred

Six days ago, I ran a blog post called Chevron Ecuador: NY Times Hides Bias, echoing the claims of other bloggers that the fact that the NY Times was a "friend of the court" (filing an amicus brief) supporting Crude Film Director Joe Berlinger's attempt to gain legal protection against giving up the outtakes from his movie Crude.

That movie, which purports to show that American Chevron Oil Company polluted the Ecuadorian Amazon, has hours of footage that was removed. As Law.com shown by presenting those videos, comments made by Steven Donziger in those removed clips, could have been damaging to Chevron's case - they were.

In the NY Times article this paragraph was 24 levels down:

But Floyd Abrams, the First Amendment lawyer who wrote a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of Mr. Berlinger that was signed by 13 news organizations, including The New York Times Company, said on Friday that it was “just not the law” that an investigative journalist cannot be compelled to turn over materials, confidential or otherwise.

The only point we were making is that the mention of the New York Times as a "friend" of the Crude Director should have been placed higher in the article. But John's emailed response is...

The piece is not an attack on Chevron, and describes in detail what a disaster for the plaintiffs the outtakes have been.

Schwartz also says the reason the paragraph was 24 levels down was because it was mentioned it in another NYTimes article, before and in a higher position.

Perhaps it's fair to speculate that, had the New York Times been aware of the exact contents of the outtakes, it may not have filed the amicus brief at all.

Meanwhile, the outtakes have changed the game for the plaintiffs, especially lead attorney Steve Donziger. Aside from Donziger's ideas about threatening Ecuadorian judges, the finding that he wrote a report by a supposedly neutral court-appointed expert may cause harm to his ability to practice law in the future.

What Donziger did was unethical. Period.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador: NY Times Buries Case Bias

Lawyer Steve Donziger and other plaintiff's who filed the so-called environmental damage lawsuit against Chevron appear to have help from some in the print media. According to Julia A. Seymour of the Business and Media Institute, the New York Times joined Crude movie director Joe Berlinger in his effort to be excused from giving over 500 hours of outtakes from the film to Chevron lawyers.

In an article on the Chevron Ecuador issue, the NY Times John Schwartz and Dave Itzkoff wrote "Floyd Abrams, an expert in First Amendment law who wrote a brief fighting the demand for the outtakes by Chevron on behalf of journalism organizations, including The New York Times, said that regardless of how revealing the clips were, the court's broad order was mistaken."

That sentence appears in a paragraph 24 levels down in the article. Buried.

And, as Seymour points out, and has been noted here, the tapes were more than revealing. The tapes were damaging to Steve Donziger's case, and effectively call his motives into question, as well as revealing the case itself to be a fraud.

The main stream American media has not looked into the strength of the evidence Donziger has presented (none), or the efforts Ecuador has made to nationalize its oil production, kicking out American firms from Ecuador in the process.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Reports Elaborate Forgery of Lawsuit Against It In Ecuador

This ran across Twitter:

Chevron Chevron
Expert discovers elaborate forgery of plaintiffs’ signatures authorizing 2003 complaint against #Chevron in #Ecuador: http://bit.ly/h1k7j0
8 minutes ago Favorite Retweet Reply

That is explosive. According to Chevron's press release, which, in part, reads...

Chevron Corporation (NYSE: CVX) today submitted expert analysis from a leading forensic specialist demonstrating that many of the signatures on the document purporting to authorize the lawsuit against Chevron in Lago Agrio, Ecuador, were forged. According to Chevron’s filing, this newly uncovered evidence of forgery and fraud makes clear that the lawsuit has been tainted with corruption from the very beginning and must be terminated.

The whole damn lawsuit's a fake. 

The lawsuit claiming that Chevron failed to conduct the proper environmental remediation activities when it produced oil in Ecuador. The lawsuit, led by American lawyer Steven Donziger, who this blogger calls "Steven The Don" was already beset with problems that point to one big fraudulent attempt to extort money from an American oil company.

Chevron filed a motion to nullify the lawsuit, but given that Ecuador itself is a party to the lawsuit and Donziger has taken meetings with many of the foxes guarding the hen-house, foremost among them Ecuador President Rafael Correa and executives of Petroecuador, it's beginning to look like a fixed deal.

If there's any real justice in Ecuador, the case will be dismissed.

Let's see what happens.

Stay tuned.

Steven Donziger Loses Chevron Ecuador Appeals Court Battle

Chevron Ecuador lawsuit boss and budding movie star Steven Donziger lost another important battle in the ongoing Chevron / Ecuador issue. Steven The Don, as this blogger will refer to Steven Donziger for his role as "The Godfather," even toward discussing a plan of intimidating an Ecuador judge, has failed, once again, to quash the Chevron subpoena granted by U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan.

According to the Courthouse News Service, on Wednesday, The 2nd Circuit Court agreed with Judge Kaplan's order in responding to Donziger's appeal of the order which has him in the position of having to be interviewed by Chevron lawyers and turn over 8,000 pages of documents related to the case.

The 2nd Circuit Court wrote:

After an independent review of the record, we conclude,substantially for the reasons stated by the District Court in its orders of November 10 andNovember 30, 2010, that the District Court did not abuse its discretion. We therefore affirm theOctober 20 and November 29, 2010, orders of the District Court and we remand the cause to theDistrict Court for further proceedings consistent with this order.

In other words, Steven The Don has to work under Judge Kaplan's order and with Chevron's subpoena.

What This Means

What this all means is an ultimate path toward proof that Steven the Don's claims that the American Oil Giant polluted the Ecuadorian Amazon until 1992 - but using false information and studies gathered well after Chevron left Ecuador, and during a time when Petroecuador, Ecuador's own oil company, was using the same oil wells and production facilities - is false and fraudulent.

Courthouse reports that Karen Hinton, the active spokesperson for Donziger, said the ruling has nothing to do with the merits of the lawsuit.

Not true.

The lawsuit Donziger has worked on covers up Petroecuador's own terrible environmental record as well as Ecuador's overall strategy of the nationalization of oil. Donziger's non-profit pitbulls at Amazon Watch have asserted that Ecuador's not a party to Steven The Don's lawsuit.    That's not true, as was discussed in this space several times before.

The silence of Amazon Watch is deafening, and for good reason.  Someone misled them.   Even now, they have to question the merits of this case.

Not All Bad Or Good

The overall point is that no one party is bad.  Chevron has been painted that way and with a frequency greater than one can imagine.  Yes, oil companies do pollute, and they help curb and prevent it too.  And the implication in this for some time is Steven The Don and his people are angels.  Not so. Indeed, Steven himself has met with Petroecuador execs - one can guess why he's not suing Ecuador's oil giant.  Moreover, they've been used by an Ecuador that seeks to keep oil revenues for itself, has kicked out American oil companies, and has done little, if anything, for its poor.

Stay tuned.

Tiger Woods tweets that Stanford shirt helped him to 66 score

Tiger Woods, The World's Greatest Golfer, has a new addiction to Twitter, and its causing his legendary Stanford Cardinal-infused hubris to show.

This tweet he issued...

TigerWoods Tiger Woods
66 today. Maybe it's the shirt? http://yfrog.com/5cdjr0j
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

...contains a link to that goofy Stanford logo on his shirt.   You will not see it here.

Woods 66 came today at the Chevron World Challenge, and is a signal that Woods is back to his old form. And, even if that comes with the occasionally delusional thoughts of Stanford sports supremacy, is a good thing.

Geez. Ok. So the Cardinal beats the sturdy Golden Bears in the Big Game. You'd think they'd won the damn National Championship the way Tiger's strutting around.

Just wait. Cal will get back the Axe in 2011's Big Game. Bet on it.

GO BEARS!

Ecuador In Bed With Chevron Accuser Donziger: U.S. Judge Lewis Kaplan

Judge Lewis Kaplan

Revealing what this blogger has charged for a year, the government of the country of Ecuador was identified as a party to the fraudulent lawsuit brought against American oil giant Chevron by lawyer Steven Donziger and the so-called "indigenous people" of the Ecuadorian Amazon River Delta.

In a 32-page document, Lewis Kaplan, U.S. District Judge, Southern District of New York, wrote that the The Republic of Ecuador's motion to intervene to block the transfer of documents relevant in the deposition of Donziger by Chevron lawyers was denied.

In the pages of the Judge's decision, Judge Kaplan reveals that Donziger failed to even note that the so-called "indigenous people" who are the Lago Agrio plaintiffs were either the focus of any one of the 8,652 documents in question, or that any one - one - of those items was written by the Lago Agrio plaintiffs.

Not one.

The Republic of Ecuador then claimed that it has an interest in those same documents, revealing itself, clumsily, to be a party to the same lawsuit that Amazon Watch tried to bully SFGate.com into having this blogger claim Ecuador was not a party to, last year.

That's right.

In an email on September 17, 2009, Amazon Watch tried to get SFGate.com to make me say this:

"The government of Ecuador is not the architect of the Chevron lawsuit, is not a party to the lawsuit, and will not be the recipient of any judgment paid by Chevron. This is a civil suit by private citizens."

I stood my ground and said that I would write a reason why Ecuador was party to the lawsuit against Chevron. Here's what I wrote, thanks to Bob McCarty:

Amazon Watch is wrong! In my previous blog post, I issued the argument proving that the Government of Ecuador was so involved in the "Aguinda v. Chevron Texaco" lawsuit that even though the were not officially a listed party, they could be named a party in court if the challenge to their status was presented.


Now, investigative blogger Bob McCarty has revealed that Ecuador is indeed a party to the case. Remember that Amazon Watch asserted...


"The government of Ecuador is not the architect of the Chevron lawsuit, is not a party to the lawsuit, and will not be the recipient of any judgment paid by Chevron. This is a civil suit by private citizens."


Yeah. Right.


According to McCarty's blog post , Washington Pesantez, Ecuador's Prosecutor General, said 90 percent of the $27 billion award would go to Ecuador if the court case was resolved against Chevron for that amount.

That silenced Amazon Watch.  Now, the organization that rails about this blogger's credibility has egg on its face.  Judge Kaplan has officially outed Ecuador as being involved in the lawsuit.   Indeed, between Ecuador claiming it would take 90 percent of any environmental damage award from an Ecuadorian court, Donziger talking of using threats of violence and intimidation against Ecuadorian judges, and Donziger claiming that he, indeed, would make billions from the case, and Donziger working with the State of Ecuador's oil company that took over Chevron's oil well, it's clear that the last people anyone really thought of was Ecuador's poor.

Indeed, Chevron has been out of Ecuador for so long,  18 years, that the real story of oil spills and environmental damage by Petroecuador and other non-American oil companies has not been effectively told.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador: Plaintiff's Video Claims of Evidence Tampering Questionable

Eager to counter the damaging Crube movie film outtakes pointing to fraudulent action on the part of American Lawyer Steve Donziger (in photo with sunglasses), the Amazon Defense Coalition came up with a novel approach: revisionist history.

Via PR spokesperson Karen Hinton, who failed to respond to emailed questions sent while preparing this blog post, the ADC now says in a press release it was Chevron who committed fraudulent actions in oil cleanup, evidence tampering and "lies to U.S. judges." The problem is the videos the ADC refers to only show claims made by Steve Donziger years after Chevron left Ecuador, which was in 1992.

This is the latest salvo in the ADC's attempt to extort money from the American Oil Giant. Chevron was an active oil producer in the Ecuadorian Amazon River Delta region. But, after pressure to leave the nation, Chevron turned over its oil production facilities to the Ecuador-owned Petroecuador, including nummerous oil wells, to Ecuador in 1992 and, after a clean activity left the country.

Petroecuador took over the oil well sites and continued work. And that leads to the problems expressed today as being caused by Chevron, when they were actually caused by Petroecuador.

There are two sources for this information: a PDF file provided by Hinton and called "DATA ON TEXPET’S CLEANUP Prepared August 22, 2008 by Stratus Consulting Inc.," and the fact that Steve Donziger is on record admitting he had meetings with Petroecuador executives in the early years of his campaign of extortion to earn a multi-billion paycheck.  (A statement made because Donziger admitted he expected to become a billionaire from this effort.)

The PDF files, on page 7, admits that Petroecuador "made changes to the pits after June 1990 (when Texpet ceased operations)." The document refers to tests done at several pits years later, when Petroecuador operated on fields and using equipment once owned by Chevron.

But the problem is the document leaves Petroecuador's post-Chevron activity as a dangerous wild card, especially when the study reads "PetroEcuador changed “site conditions” after the initial remediation survey work."

How? By drilling oil? That's not explained at all.

Thus, it's difficult, if not impossible, to take the Amazon Defense Coalition's claims seriously. It looks more like a hail mary pass attempt after the opposition offense has intercepted the pass and scored a touchdown.

Stay tuned.

Chevron Ecuador Case: Steven Donziger In Big Trouble With Judge Kaplan

In seeking a motion to quash Chevron's request to dipose him, Steven Donziger, the ringleader and mastermind of the plot to defraud the American Oil Giant of up to $27 Billion by claiming it left the Ecuadorian Amazon envrionmentally damaged, when it did not, placed himself in big trouble.

The resulting 52-page ruling by heavyweight New York U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan casts a dark light on the legal career of Steven Donziger, and rubber-stamps every assertion this blogger made in this video below on August 14th 2008:



Particularly damning is this statement by the judge:

On behalf of the Lago Agrio plaintiffs, Donziger, directly or indirectly, has lobbiedthe Ecuadorian and United States governments, raised money to support the litigation efforts,organized the plaintiffs’ media campaign, and solicited and interacted with celebrity supporters. Donziger’s statements, conduct, and demeanor in Crude and the outtakes, as well as other evidence,suggest that many of his activities have had little to do with the performance of legal services anda great deal to do with political activity, intimidation of the Ecuadorian courts, attempts to procurecriminal prosecutions for the purpose of extracting a settlement, and presenting a message to theworld media. This becomes even clearer when one considers still other statements and incidentsdepicted in Crude and the outtakes.

It's for those activities that legal observers have said Donziger is in possible criminal trouble. All of this he's done can result in the loss of his ability to practice law.

Stay tuned.

Maria Viramontes, Myrna Lopez, Receive Key Endorsement From The West County Times For Richmond City Council

Richmond City Council candidates Maria Viramontes and Myrna Lopez secured a crucial endorsement this week from the West County Times.

According to the West County Times, “…incumbents Viramontes and Lopez understand the city’s finances, the need to work with the business community and the need to protect the environment.”

Receiving the sought after endorsement of the West County Times is crucial for Lopez and Viramontes, who both claim to have the economy as their first priority in this election. Voters will be going to the polls on Tuesday to cast their vote, choosing from a diverse group of ten candidates and this endorsement will be sure to make Viramontes and Lopez stand out as the best candidates for the council.

The website http://www.richmondjobsnow.org/ has more information on both Lopez and Viramontes including mail pieces that describe their stances on the economy, public safety and education in Richmond.

The economy is definitely playing an important role in this year’s election and Lopez has proven to make the right decisions for the people of Richmond as a City Councilwoman in the past. According to a recent mail piece that describes Lopez’s work to improve the economy in Richmond, “Myrna was one of the chief architects of an agreement with Chevron to create 1,200 new jobs and reduce pollution by upgrading the refinery’s equipment.”

The future of children’s education in Richmond is an important factor in this year’s election as well. A recent mail piece for Viramontes describes her passion for maintaining quality schools for Richmond’s children to learn: “When West Contra Costa School District tried to close three Richmond schools, last year, Maria Viramontes was one of the first to stand up to oppose the proposal. She helped develop a comprehensive financial plan to keep the schools open and provide necessary funding to core programs. She understands our youth deserve the resources they need to succeed.”

For more information on both candidates, please visit:
Myrna Lopez: http://myrnalopez.com/
Maria Viramontes: http://mariaviramontes.org/

Richmond City Council: Myrna Lopez and Maria Viramontes Making Richmond Streets Safer

Richmond City Council Candidates Myrna Lopez and Maria Viramontes are running for election this November 2. Word is getting out on their successes in improving public safety in Richmond.

Among the important issues that the Richmond City Council will be working on next year are strengthening public safety, improving education, and getting Richmond back to work, particularly at the Chevron Richmond Refinery where the long-stalled Renewal project would bring back more than 1,000 much needed jobs to the community.

According to mail pieces that are posted on RichmondJobsNow.org both Myrna Lopez and Maria Viramontes, candidates for Richmond City Council on November 2, both have strong records that are making the streets safer.

According to the pieces on Myrna Lopez:

Myrna Lopez Found Funding to Put More Police on Our Streets: Myrna Lopez knows that making our streets safer begins with putting more policemen on our streets. She supported an initiative to increase the number of officers on patrol – especially in high crime areas. And it’s working, Crime in Richmond is down for the third year in a row.

Myrna Lopez is making a real and direct difference in the lives of Richmond residents – especially when it comes to making our neighborhoods safer. She helped lead the push to secure funding for more police officers. And that’s just for starters. When it comes to safer communities, Myrna believes that more police officers are a necessity but so are good jobs and better schools.

The pieces on Myrna Lopez are available here and here on RichmondJobsNow.org.

According to the piece on Maria Viramontes:

Maria Viramontes: More Funding for More Cops on the Beat in Richmond: Crime is down in Richmond. And that’s no accident. City Councilmember Maria Viramontes has been on the forefront of the effort to put more police on the beat. Officer staffing levels are the highest they’ve been in many years — and it’s having an impact.

To continue making progress, Richmond needs to turn up its commitment to funding our police force – not merely offer lip service to root causes of crime. With Maria Viramontes on the case, Richmond has a City Councilmember whose eyes are wide open and whose commitment to keeping our streets safe never waivers.

In 2007, Maria Viramontes authored legislation to increase the number of police officers to 3 per 1,000 residents in high crime areas. Today, there are 193 officers patrolling our streets, making them safer.

Crime reports show that crime is down for the third year in a row. Homicides remain a serious problem but Maria Viramontes is pushing for a new plan to raise the number of officers to 213 – the same level Richmond had when our crime rates were their lowest ever.

The piece on Maria Viramontes is available here.

According to "About the Campaign" on RichmondJobsNow.org, "On November 2nd, Richmond residents will elect a new Mayor and three members to the City Council. With so much at stake, it is important for voters to be informed about the issues that will affect our city’s future. This website provides articles and posts about the upcoming election."

Myrna Lopez website: http://myrnalopez.com/

Maria Viramontes website: http://mariaviramontes.org/

More to come on the Richmond City Council elections.