Article
Evidence of fraud mounts in Ecuadorian suit against Chevron
A lawsuit against Chevron in Ecuador…has suffered severe, crippling setbacks in recent months, as key plaintiffs lawyers have come under credible and weighty allegations of fraud. The accusations threaten to disrupt…a…17-year-old suit filed on behalf of Indians of the Ecuadorian Amazon who seek environmental clean-up of lands where Texaco-acquired by Chevron in 2001-drilled for oil…Over the past ten months, Chevron's outside lawyers…have filed 11 civil actions in federal courts across the United States, each designed to pull back the curtain on what they say is an elaborate, two-year-long charade in which plaintiffs lawyers covertly planned and ghostwrote a crucial report on damages...Plaintiffs lawyers have denied wrongdoing, saying that their actions are being mischaracterized, and were permissible in Ecuador. It should be noted that the fraud claims…do not necessarily impugn the legitimacy of the Indians' underlying cause…