Listen now | This week on Krystal Kyle & Friends: updates on the defamation suit filed by Mike Lindell, Sydney Powell, and Rudy Giuliani; the latest in bipartisan corruption and personal gain from government contracts; and, of course, our special conversation with human rights attorney Steven Donziger, on his landmark case against Chevron.
We‘re lucky those Trumpers aren’t particularly smart. When they claimed that they have video evidence of people admitting a grand election fraud conspiracy, they could just have used modern technology and produced a deep fake. Deep fake is a Pandora’s Box waiting to be opened. Whenever one side starts using this shit in politics, all hell will break lose.
It's hard to for me write this, but, in your coverage of the Donzinger case, I think you have been had by a grifter (Donzinger). If Donzinger's story sounds too cute and fits a narrative too well, that is because it is a grift that will set us all back.
Donzinger asserts that Judge Kaplan is in Chevron's pocket and is out to bury Chevron's environmental crimes. But this isn't what Kaplan ruled against Donzinger for in 2014 - Kaplan convicted Donzinger of rigging an Ecuadorian court and ghostwriting the judgement against Chevron for the ~$10B for environmental damage. In 2014, Judge Kaplan nullified the ability enforce the Ecuadorian ruling in the USA, on the grounds that the judgement was corruptly obtained - it is very telling that Donzinger refuses to explain this in his public appearances.
Donzinger keeps trying to conflate:
A) whether Chevron/Texaco polluted Ecuador (this certainly true); with
B) whether the ~$10B judgment was corruptly obtained at Donzinger's behest and instigation.
This is the crux of the grift. A) is unequivocally true - Chevron/Texaco people behaved heinously in Ecuador (and probably elsewhere; see Shell Nigeria for another fascinating case study of "holy shit, what the hell where you thinking?!") and *the polluter needs to pay up*.
But, this doesn't mean victims of crimes, even 'human rights champions', can start doing B), bribing judges or otherwise making shit up. That only destroys the rule of law and sets everyone back. It has taken the US Justice System to a place where it must decline to enforce a corrupt ruling against worthy victims, and, left those victims in limbo.
I caught one straight factual lie in Donzinger's words on the show too - the Canadian Supreme court upheld Kaplan's ruling that the $10B judgment was corruptly obtained. He asserts this repeatedly, it is just a straight lie. Here is the link:
The witness Donzinger asserts Chevron bribed at his 2014 US trial was one of the Ecudorean judges administering this case in Ecuador, dude named Guerra. Guerra is an altogether unsavory and sketchy guy, and has recanted/lied multiple times - I wouldn't trust a word he says. But, here's the thing, you cannot simultaneously believe that i) the initial $10B Ecudorean judgement is legitimate and just, when Guerra is clearly corrupt; and that ii) Chevron successfully bribed this witness to testify against Donzinger before Judge Kaplan in 2014. Both the initial $10B ruling being legit, and Guerra being corrupt, cannot both be true.
Also, and this is the key point, Judge Kaplan DID NOT solely rely upon Guerra's testimony in 2014 to make his ruling. There is extensive documentary evidence - similarities between the content of the judgement, and, internal documents created by firms associated with Donzinger. See page 200 of Judge Kaplan's 2014 ruling and read on.
The 2014 Kaplan ruling went to an appeals court in 2016. Ruled against Donzinger. The New York Bar didn't just take Kaplan's word for it when they disbarred Donzinger. Canadian Appeals & Supreme Courts - same thing, the legal substances of the matter is that Donzinger is trying to enforce an Ecudorean court's ruling that was corruptly obtained; western liberal democratic justice systems keep shooting him down. And now Donzinger is trying to exert pressure on the justice system in the court of public opinion and spin a grift for money.
Donzinger is a classic example of the Clinton Foundation "Get rich by doing good" trainwreck in action. He was trying to get rich/make a name for himself by taking down Chevron in Ecuador. That devolved into corrupting a justice system and, now, lying/misleading well-meaning leftists skeptical of immense corporate power into believing this grift.
If Donzinger's story sounds too cute and fits that narrative too well, that is because it is a grift that will set us all back.
Press him on the specific factual details of what the hell happened in the writing of the $10B judgment in Ecuador. Otherwise, to mangle some legal proverbs, "fruit from this poison tree is going to poison us all".
Pretty sure a shady guy (guerre) from Ecuador has a pretty low price to make a calculated false statement, but hey maybe I’m wrong. Regardless, I don’t think there is solid évidence here to suggest that donzinger bribed judges in Ecuador, I think there is a lot of evidence that suggests chevron would spend 10 billion dollars on lawyers to not spend 10 billion helping the communities they destroyed.
On Guerre: fully fucking agree. this guy was taking money and playing both sides. Unfortunately he sounds pretty representative of the judges that cooked up the original ~$10B ruling - the poison tree fucking over the Ecuadorian locals and everyone else.
Go read the original 2014 Kaplan ruling for the solid evidence. Here follows the first 3 pages of the ruling - read it and see if alarm bells aren't going off, then read the rest of it:
Steven Donziger, a New York City lawyer, led a group of American and Ecuadorian
lawyers who brought an action in Ecuador (the “Lago Agrio” case) in the names of 47 plaintiffs (the “Lago Agrio Plaintiffs” or “LAPs”), on behalf of thousands of indigenous peoples of the Orienté region of Ecuador, against Chevron Corporation (“Chevron”). They claimed that Chevron was responsible for extensive environmental damage caused by oil activities of Texaco, Inc. (“Texaco”), that ended more than twenty years ago and long before Chevron acquired Texaco’s stock.
After years of pressuring Chevron to settle by a variety of both legitimate and
illegitimate means, Donziger and his clients obtained a multibillion dollar judgment (the “Judgment”) in the Ecuadorian courts and now seek to enforce it around the world. Chevron then brought this action, contending among other things that the Judgment was procured by fraud.
Following a full trial, it now seeks equitable relief against Donziger and the two of his Ecuadorian clients who defended this case in order to prevent any of them from profiting from the alleged fraud or from seeking to enforce the Judgment in the United States.
This case is extraordinary. The facts are many and sometimes complex. They
include things that normally come only out of Hollywood – coded emails among Donziger and his colleagues describing their private interactions with and machinations directed at judges and a court appointed expert, their payments to a supposedly neutral expert out of a secret account, a lawyer who invited a film crew to innumerable private strategy meetings and even to ex parte meetings with judges, an Ecuadorian judge who claims to have written the multibillion dollar decision but who was
so inexperienced and uncomfortable with civil cases that he had someone else (a former judge who had been removed from the bench) draft some civil decisions for him, an 18-year old typist who supposedly did Internet research in American, English, and French law for the same judge, who knew only Spanish, and much more. The evidence is voluminous.
The transnational elements of the case make it sensitive and challenging. Nevertheless, the Court has had the benefit of a lengthy
trial. It has heard 31 witnesses in person and considered deposition and/or other sworn or, in one instance, stipulated testimony of 37 others. It has considered thousands of exhibits. It has made its findings, which of necessity are lengthy and detailed.
Upon consideration of all of the evidence, including the credibility of the witnesses
– though several of the most important declined to testify – the Court finds that Donziger began his involvement in this controversy with a desire to improve conditions in the area in which his Ecuadorian clients live. To be sure, he sought also to do well for himself while doing good for others, but there was nothing wrong with that. In the end, however, he and the Ecuadorian lawyers he led corrupted the Lago Agrio case. They submitted fraudulent evidence. They coerced one judge, first to use a court-appointed, supposedly impartial, “global expert” to make an overall damages assessment and, then, to appoint to that important role a man whom Donziger hand-picked and paid to “totally play ball” with the LAPs. They then paid a Colorado consulting firm secretly to write all or most of the global expert’s report, falsely presented the report as the work of the court-appointed and supposedly impartial expert, and told half-truths or worse to U.S. courts in attempts to prevent exposure of that and other wrongdoing. Ultimately, the LAP team wrote the Lago Agrio court’s Judgment themselves and promised $500,000 to the Ecuadorian judge to rule in their favor and sign their judgment. If ever there were a case warranting equitable relief with
respect to a judgment procured by fraud, this is it.
The defendants seek to avoid responsibility for their actions by emphasizing that the
Lago Agrio case took place in Ecuador and by invoking the principle of comity. But that warrants no different conclusion. Comity and respect for other nations are important. But comity does not command blind acquiescence in injustice, least of all acquiescence within the bounds of our own nation. Courts of equity long have granted relief against fraudulent judgments entered in other states and, though less frequently, other countries. Moreover, the United States has important interests here.
The misconduct at issue was planned, supervised, financed and executed in important (but not all) respects by Americans in the United States in order to extract money from a U.S. victim. That said, considerations of comity and the avoidance of any misunderstanding have shaped the relief sought here. Chevron no longer seeks, and this Court does not grant, an injunction barring enforcement of the Lago Agrio Judgment anywhere in the world. What this Court does do is to prevent Donziger and the two LAP Representatives, who are subject to this Court’s personal jurisdiction, from profiting in any way from the egregious fraud that occurred here. That is quite
a different matter. Indeed, the LAP Representatives’ lawyer recently conceded before the Second Circuit that the defendants “would not have a problem” with “the alternative relief that [Chevron] would be seeking, such as enjoining the person who paid the bribe from benefitting from it,” assuming that the judge was bribed.1 Defendants thus have acknowledged the propriety of equitable
relief to prevent individuals subject to the Court’s jurisdiction from benefitting from misdeeds for which they are responsible. And while the Court does enjoin enforcement of the Judgment by these defendants in the United States, that limited injunction raises no issues of comity or international relations. It is the prerogative of American courts to determine whether foreign judgments may be enforced in this country.
Donziger is intelligent, resourceful, and a master of public and media relations. An
extensive public relations and media campaign has been part of his strategy from early days, and it continues. Among its objectives has been to shift the focus from the fraud on Chevron and the Lago Agrio court to the environmental harm that Donziger and the LAPs claim was done in the Orienté. Indeed, that was a principal focus of defendants’ case at trial and of their post-trial briefing. But one should not be distracted from the issues actually presented in this case.
The Court assumes that there is pollution in the Orienté. On that assumption, Texaco
and perhaps even Chevron – though it never drilled for oil in Ecuador – might bear some responsibility. In any case, improvement of conditions for the residents of the Orienté appears to be both desirable and overdue. But the defendants’ effort to change the subject to the Orienté, understandable as it is as a tactic, misses the point of this case.
The issue here is not what happened in the Orienté more than twenty years ago and
who, if anyone, now is responsible for any wrongs then done. It instead is whether a court decision was procured by corrupt means, regardless of whether the cause was just. An innocent defendant is no more entitled to submit false evidence, to coopt and pay off a court-appointed expert, or to coerce or bribe a judge or jury than a guilty one. So even if Donziger and his clients had a just cause – and the Court expresses no opinion on that – they were not entitled to corrupt the process to
achieve their goal.
Justice is not served by inflicting injustice. The ends do not justify the means. There
is no “Robin Hood” defense to illegal and wrongful conduct. And the defendants’ “this-is-the-wayit- is-done-in-Ecuador” excuses – actually a remarkable insult to the people of Ecuador – do not help them.
Please, read the full judgement. Link (free) is here:
Some news show 20/20, 60 minutes, should do a segment on this so the public wrath comes upon them. (Garland/Biden/Chevron)
We‘re lucky those Trumpers aren’t particularly smart. When they claimed that they have video evidence of people admitting a grand election fraud conspiracy, they could just have used modern technology and produced a deep fake. Deep fake is a Pandora’s Box waiting to be opened. Whenever one side starts using this shit in politics, all hell will break lose.
Whenever I tune in and listen/watch Krystal or Kyle I have more truths brought out to me.
Thanks always, 🐸
Kyle and Krystal are true American heroes for their courage and important reporting on topics that matter. Thank you both.
Closed-source programmers' computer code cannot be verified as trustworthy.
It's hard to for me write this, but, in your coverage of the Donzinger case, I think you have been had by a grifter (Donzinger). If Donzinger's story sounds too cute and fits a narrative too well, that is because it is a grift that will set us all back.
Donzinger asserts that Judge Kaplan is in Chevron's pocket and is out to bury Chevron's environmental crimes. But this isn't what Kaplan ruled against Donzinger for in 2014 - Kaplan convicted Donzinger of rigging an Ecuadorian court and ghostwriting the judgement against Chevron for the ~$10B for environmental damage. In 2014, Judge Kaplan nullified the ability enforce the Ecuadorian ruling in the USA, on the grounds that the judgement was corruptly obtained - it is very telling that Donzinger refuses to explain this in his public appearances.
Donzinger keeps trying to conflate:
A) whether Chevron/Texaco polluted Ecuador (this certainly true); with
B) whether the ~$10B judgment was corruptly obtained at Donzinger's behest and instigation.
This is the crux of the grift. A) is unequivocally true - Chevron/Texaco people behaved heinously in Ecuador (and probably elsewhere; see Shell Nigeria for another fascinating case study of "holy shit, what the hell where you thinking?!") and *the polluter needs to pay up*.
But, this doesn't mean victims of crimes, even 'human rights champions', can start doing B), bribing judges or otherwise making shit up. That only destroys the rule of law and sets everyone back. It has taken the US Justice System to a place where it must decline to enforce a corrupt ruling against worthy victims, and, left those victims in limbo.
I caught one straight factual lie in Donzinger's words on the show too - the Canadian Supreme court upheld Kaplan's ruling that the $10B judgment was corruptly obtained. He asserts this repeatedly, it is just a straight lie. Here is the link:
https://www.ontariocourts.ca/decisions/2018/2018ONCA0472.htm
The witness Donzinger asserts Chevron bribed at his 2014 US trial was one of the Ecudorean judges administering this case in Ecuador, dude named Guerra. Guerra is an altogether unsavory and sketchy guy, and has recanted/lied multiple times - I wouldn't trust a word he says. But, here's the thing, you cannot simultaneously believe that i) the initial $10B Ecudorean judgement is legitimate and just, when Guerra is clearly corrupt; and that ii) Chevron successfully bribed this witness to testify against Donzinger before Judge Kaplan in 2014. Both the initial $10B ruling being legit, and Guerra being corrupt, cannot both be true.
Also, and this is the key point, Judge Kaplan DID NOT solely rely upon Guerra's testimony in 2014 to make his ruling. There is extensive documentary evidence - similarities between the content of the judgement, and, internal documents created by firms associated with Donzinger. See page 200 of Judge Kaplan's 2014 ruling and read on.
The 2014 Kaplan ruling went to an appeals court in 2016. Ruled against Donzinger. The New York Bar didn't just take Kaplan's word for it when they disbarred Donzinger. Canadian Appeals & Supreme Courts - same thing, the legal substances of the matter is that Donzinger is trying to enforce an Ecudorean court's ruling that was corruptly obtained; western liberal democratic justice systems keep shooting him down. And now Donzinger is trying to exert pressure on the justice system in the court of public opinion and spin a grift for money.
Donzinger is a classic example of the Clinton Foundation "Get rich by doing good" trainwreck in action. He was trying to get rich/make a name for himself by taking down Chevron in Ecuador. That devolved into corrupting a justice system and, now, lying/misleading well-meaning leftists skeptical of immense corporate power into believing this grift.
If Donzinger's story sounds too cute and fits that narrative too well, that is because it is a grift that will set us all back.
Kyle, Krystal & team - this guy is very bad news and is grifting you. Please, as a huge fan of Breaking Points and this show, take a moment and go read through the entire 500 page 2014 Judge Kaplan ruling against Donzinger (PDF Here: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/new-york/nysdce/1:2011cv00691/374606/1874/)
Press him on the specific factual details of what the hell happened in the writing of the $10B judgment in Ecuador. Otherwise, to mangle some legal proverbs, "fruit from this poison tree is going to poison us all".
Pretty sure a shady guy (guerre) from Ecuador has a pretty low price to make a calculated false statement, but hey maybe I’m wrong. Regardless, I don’t think there is solid évidence here to suggest that donzinger bribed judges in Ecuador, I think there is a lot of evidence that suggests chevron would spend 10 billion dollars on lawyers to not spend 10 billion helping the communities they destroyed.
On Guerre: fully fucking agree. this guy was taking money and playing both sides. Unfortunately he sounds pretty representative of the judges that cooked up the original ~$10B ruling - the poison tree fucking over the Ecuadorian locals and everyone else.
Go read the original 2014 Kaplan ruling for the solid evidence. Here follows the first 3 pages of the ruling - read it and see if alarm bells aren't going off, then read the rest of it:
Steven Donziger, a New York City lawyer, led a group of American and Ecuadorian
lawyers who brought an action in Ecuador (the “Lago Agrio” case) in the names of 47 plaintiffs (the “Lago Agrio Plaintiffs” or “LAPs”), on behalf of thousands of indigenous peoples of the Orienté region of Ecuador, against Chevron Corporation (“Chevron”). They claimed that Chevron was responsible for extensive environmental damage caused by oil activities of Texaco, Inc. (“Texaco”), that ended more than twenty years ago and long before Chevron acquired Texaco’s stock.
After years of pressuring Chevron to settle by a variety of both legitimate and
illegitimate means, Donziger and his clients obtained a multibillion dollar judgment (the “Judgment”) in the Ecuadorian courts and now seek to enforce it around the world. Chevron then brought this action, contending among other things that the Judgment was procured by fraud.
Following a full trial, it now seeks equitable relief against Donziger and the two of his Ecuadorian clients who defended this case in order to prevent any of them from profiting from the alleged fraud or from seeking to enforce the Judgment in the United States.
This case is extraordinary. The facts are many and sometimes complex. They
include things that normally come only out of Hollywood – coded emails among Donziger and his colleagues describing their private interactions with and machinations directed at judges and a court appointed expert, their payments to a supposedly neutral expert out of a secret account, a lawyer who invited a film crew to innumerable private strategy meetings and even to ex parte meetings with judges, an Ecuadorian judge who claims to have written the multibillion dollar decision but who was
so inexperienced and uncomfortable with civil cases that he had someone else (a former judge who had been removed from the bench) draft some civil decisions for him, an 18-year old typist who supposedly did Internet research in American, English, and French law for the same judge, who knew only Spanish, and much more. The evidence is voluminous.
The transnational elements of the case make it sensitive and challenging. Nevertheless, the Court has had the benefit of a lengthy
trial. It has heard 31 witnesses in person and considered deposition and/or other sworn or, in one instance, stipulated testimony of 37 others. It has considered thousands of exhibits. It has made its findings, which of necessity are lengthy and detailed.
Upon consideration of all of the evidence, including the credibility of the witnesses
– though several of the most important declined to testify – the Court finds that Donziger began his involvement in this controversy with a desire to improve conditions in the area in which his Ecuadorian clients live. To be sure, he sought also to do well for himself while doing good for others, but there was nothing wrong with that. In the end, however, he and the Ecuadorian lawyers he led corrupted the Lago Agrio case. They submitted fraudulent evidence. They coerced one judge, first to use a court-appointed, supposedly impartial, “global expert” to make an overall damages assessment and, then, to appoint to that important role a man whom Donziger hand-picked and paid to “totally play ball” with the LAPs. They then paid a Colorado consulting firm secretly to write all or most of the global expert’s report, falsely presented the report as the work of the court-appointed and supposedly impartial expert, and told half-truths or worse to U.S. courts in attempts to prevent exposure of that and other wrongdoing. Ultimately, the LAP team wrote the Lago Agrio court’s Judgment themselves and promised $500,000 to the Ecuadorian judge to rule in their favor and sign their judgment. If ever there were a case warranting equitable relief with
respect to a judgment procured by fraud, this is it.
The defendants seek to avoid responsibility for their actions by emphasizing that the
Lago Agrio case took place in Ecuador and by invoking the principle of comity. But that warrants no different conclusion. Comity and respect for other nations are important. But comity does not command blind acquiescence in injustice, least of all acquiescence within the bounds of our own nation. Courts of equity long have granted relief against fraudulent judgments entered in other states and, though less frequently, other countries. Moreover, the United States has important interests here.
The misconduct at issue was planned, supervised, financed and executed in important (but not all) respects by Americans in the United States in order to extract money from a U.S. victim. That said, considerations of comity and the avoidance of any misunderstanding have shaped the relief sought here. Chevron no longer seeks, and this Court does not grant, an injunction barring enforcement of the Lago Agrio Judgment anywhere in the world. What this Court does do is to prevent Donziger and the two LAP Representatives, who are subject to this Court’s personal jurisdiction, from profiting in any way from the egregious fraud that occurred here. That is quite
a different matter. Indeed, the LAP Representatives’ lawyer recently conceded before the Second Circuit that the defendants “would not have a problem” with “the alternative relief that [Chevron] would be seeking, such as enjoining the person who paid the bribe from benefitting from it,” assuming that the judge was bribed.1 Defendants thus have acknowledged the propriety of equitable
relief to prevent individuals subject to the Court’s jurisdiction from benefitting from misdeeds for which they are responsible. And while the Court does enjoin enforcement of the Judgment by these defendants in the United States, that limited injunction raises no issues of comity or international relations. It is the prerogative of American courts to determine whether foreign judgments may be enforced in this country.
Donziger is intelligent, resourceful, and a master of public and media relations. An
extensive public relations and media campaign has been part of his strategy from early days, and it continues. Among its objectives has been to shift the focus from the fraud on Chevron and the Lago Agrio court to the environmental harm that Donziger and the LAPs claim was done in the Orienté. Indeed, that was a principal focus of defendants’ case at trial and of their post-trial briefing. But one should not be distracted from the issues actually presented in this case.
The Court assumes that there is pollution in the Orienté. On that assumption, Texaco
and perhaps even Chevron – though it never drilled for oil in Ecuador – might bear some responsibility. In any case, improvement of conditions for the residents of the Orienté appears to be both desirable and overdue. But the defendants’ effort to change the subject to the Orienté, understandable as it is as a tactic, misses the point of this case.
The issue here is not what happened in the Orienté more than twenty years ago and
who, if anyone, now is responsible for any wrongs then done. It instead is whether a court decision was procured by corrupt means, regardless of whether the cause was just. An innocent defendant is no more entitled to submit false evidence, to coopt and pay off a court-appointed expert, or to coerce or bribe a judge or jury than a guilty one. So even if Donziger and his clients had a just cause – and the Court expresses no opinion on that – they were not entitled to corrupt the process to
achieve their goal.
Justice is not served by inflicting injustice. The ends do not justify the means. There
is no “Robin Hood” defense to illegal and wrongful conduct. And the defendants’ “this-is-the-wayit- is-done-in-Ecuador” excuses – actually a remarkable insult to the people of Ecuador – do not help them.
Please, read the full judgement. Link (free) is here:
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/new-york/nysdce/1:2011cv00691/374606/1874/