Saturday, April 6, 2013

More Revelations About Chevron’s Paid Witness & Its Miami Lawyer, Andres Rivero

Chevron not only is lying to a U.S. court about what happened in the historic Ecuadorian trial that the oil giant lost, it also offered a $1 million bribe to turn evidence against the Ecuadorians and their lawyers, testified an Ecuador judge in a legal declaration filed yesterday in the Southern District Court of New York.

Ecuador Judge Nicolás Zambrano, who found Chevron guilty in February 2011 of the world’s largest oil-related environmental disaster, submitted the filing to the U.S. court, in response to false charges brought by Chevron that Zambrano allowed the Ecuadorians’ lawyers to write his judgment for payment.

Zambrano said in his declaration that only he wrote the detailed 188-page ruling, documenting the extensive contamination of Chevron’s substandard drilling and exploratory system wrought upon the environment and the impoverished indigenous people living near the pollution. Chevron has argued that Zambrano was incapable of writing such a judgment and has entered into evidence testimony by another judge, Alberto Guerra, that the real authors are the Ecuadorians’ lawyers, charges that the lawyers deny.

Only problem is Guerra has been paid at least $324,000 for his testimony and likely will be paid much, much more, given the unbelievable agreement Chevron has negotiated with Guerra, who now lives in Miami with his family and his son’s family – all at Chevron’s expense.

Importantly, Chevron’s own lawyers have admitted that Guerra actually approached Chevron in 2009 about writing the judgment in its favor if they would pay him.

Not surprisingly, about that time, Guerra announced publicly that he thought the lawsuit against Chevron was not legitimate, even though the trial was underway.

Also underway at the same time was a Chevron sting operation to derail the trial by staging a phony bribery attempt against yet another judge who heard the case. It failed miserably, but Chevron spent much of the year organizing it and publicizing its sensational but false allegations of bribes. 

At no time in 2009, 2010 and 2011, during years of hysterically wild accusations of corruption and fraud charged by Chevron, did the oil giant breathe a word about Guerra offering to write the judgment for Chevron for money.

If Chevron wanted to prove that the Ecuador courts were corrupt, here was its perfect opportunity. Yet, Chevron’s lawyers, not known for avoiding a media interview in Quito, were silent.

Now Zambrano reveals that Guerra as Chevron's proxy approached him in August 2012 with an offer to turn evidence against the Ecuadorians’ lawyers for $1 million or as much money as Zambrano might want.

Zambrano rejected the offer then and later avoided overtures in January 2013 by Chevron lawyer Andres Rivero who called Zambrano and urged a meeting. Zambrano refused.

The 20-year-old case, now being litigated to seize Chevron's assets in Brazil, Argentina, Canada and Ecuador as payment for the judgment, continues to take twists and turns in the U.S., both sides slinging charges fast and furious.

But, there are two charges that even Chevron cannot deny: 

One: Chevron’s man, Alberto Guerra, is as corrupt as the day is long.

And, two: Texaco, which Chevron bought, dumped 16 billion gallons of toxic water and oil directly into the rainforest waterways and built 900 unlined pits and filled them with pure crude that has leeched into soil and underground water -- all because it wanted to save money. Chevron's company treated the rainforest like a garbage dump and its people as disposable as the toxic oil it left behind.

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