Chevron's Pockets Are Deeper Than Yours - and Ecuador's

[Law firm] Patton Boggs today abandoned the Ecuadorian rain forest residents on whose behalf it had fought zealously to hold Chevron responsible for contamination in the northeastern oil-producing region of the Andean country. It’s almost unheard of, however, for a major law firm to humiliate itself in the fashion Patton Boggs has done in the face of Chevron’s threat to pursue pending fraud allegations against the Washington (D.C.) firm. Patton Boggs did not admit to any wrongdoing in connection with the settlement.

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Patton Boggs also agreed to provide Chevron with supportive documents and testimony and to pay the company $15 million as a tangible symbol of its abasement.

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The bizarre saga stems from a February 2011 judgment in an Ecuadorian trial court that Chevron is culpable for decades of oil contamination in that country. The liability verdict was upheld by Ecuador’s Supreme Court, but the $19 billion in damages was halved to $9.5 billion.

Chevron refused to pay, arguing that the architect of the judgment, New York plaintiffs’ attorney Steven Donziger, fabricated evidence, coerced Ecuadorian judges, and participated in the ghostwriting of supposedly neutral expert reports and the February 2011 ruling itself. Chevron formalized those allegations in a U.S. civil racketeering suit against Donziger that produced a March 2014 verdict against the plaintiffs’ lawyer. Donziger denies wrongdoing and has appealed.

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Patton Boggs [had] signed on as co-counsel with Donziger, agreeing to use its expertise and influence to help enforce the Ecuadorian judgment in courts around the world. That led to Chevron’s accusing the law firm of participating in the racketeering conspiracy pinned on Donziger by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan. Patton Boggs, in turn, accused Chevron and its main outside law firm, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, of abusive tactics. In the wake of Judge Kaplan’s March ruling against Donziger, however, Patton Boggs decided to throw in the towel.

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Apart from Patton Boggs, a number of other former Donziger allies, including lawyers, scientific experts, and financiers, have disavowed their past relationships with the plaintiffs’ attorney and their allegations against Chevron.

  Business Week