Palast on Drive Time: “I let the Chevron lawyers hang themselves.”

Chevron set out to destroy Steven Donziger, to make an example of a
human rights lawyer that dares take on the petroleum pirates. But
the oil giant also went after journalists, in one case, filing a
complaint against the BBC Television reporter that broke the story
that Chevron had destroyed key evidence in the case. I was that
reporter — and survived with my job after a year of hearings. But
Chevron’s prosecution did a good job of scaring off other
journalists. Some were scared off; some bought off. PBS News Hour
wouldn’t touch the death-by-oil story. The official chief sponsor
of the PBS News Hour? Chevron. Here’s the story, broadcast by BBC
(https://youtu.be/W1FIXwtfvBs) and, in the US, by Democracy Now!,
the story you won’t find on the Petroleum Broadcast System. I’ve
gone way out of my way to get ChevronTexaco’s side of the story. I
finally chased them down in Ecuador’s capital, Quito. I showed them
a study of the epidemic of childhood leukemia centered on where
their company dumped oil sludge.
(https://chevroninecuador.org/assets/docs/childhood-leukemia.pdf)
Here’s their reply: “And it’s the only case of cancer in the world?
How many cases of children with cancer do you have in the States?”
Texaco’s lawyer, Rodrigo Perez, was chuckling and snorting.
“Scientifically, nobody has proved that crude causes cancer.” OK,
then. But what about the epidemiological study about children with
cancer in the Amazon traced to hydrocarbons? The parents of the
dead kids, he said, would have some big hurdles in court: “If there
is somebody with cancer there, they must prove it is caused by
crude or by the petroleum industry. And, second, they have to prove
that it is OUR crude.” Perez leaned over with a huge grin. “Which
is absolutely impossible.” He grinned even harder. Maybe some guy
eating monkeys in the jungle can’t prove it. And maybe that’s
because the evidence of oil dumping was destroyed. Deliberately, by
Chevron. I passed the ChevronTexaco legal duo a document from their
files labeled “Personal y confidential.” They read in silence. They
stayed silent quite a while. Jaime Varela, Chevron’s lawyer, was
wearing his tan golf pants and white shoes, an open shirt and
bespoke blue blazer. He had a blow-dried bouffant hairdo much
favored by the ruling elite of Latin America and skin whiter than
mine, a color also favored by the elite. Jaime had been grinning
too. He read the memo. He stopped grinning. The key part says,
“Todos los informes previos deben ser sacados de las oficinas
principales y las del campo, y ser destruidos.” “. . . Reports . .
. are to be removed from the division and field offices and be
destroyed.” It came from the company boss in the States, “R. C.
Shields, Presidente de la Junta.” Removed and destroyed. That
smells an awful lot like an order to destroy evidence, which in
this case means evidence of abandoned pits of deadly drilling
residue. Destroying evidence that is part of a court action
constitutes fraud. In the United States, that would be a crime, a
jail-time crime. OK, gents, you want to tell me about this
document? “Can we have a copy of this?” Varela asked me, pretending
he’d never seen it before in his life. I’ll pretend with them, if
that gets me information. “Sure. You’ve never seen this?” The
ritual of innocence continued as they asked a secretary to make
copies. “We’re sure there’s an explanation,” Varela said. I’m sure
there is. “We’ll get back to you as soon as we find out what it
is.” I’m still waiting. Learn more about #StevenDonziger and why
he's facing prison for fighting Chevron:
https://www.gregpalast.com/facing-prison-for-fighting-chevron/
#StevenDonziger #FreeDonziger #BigOil #Pollution #Environment
#ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Activism