WEBVTT - S5 Ep 8 | Damages 0:00:00.440 --> 0:00:03.040 I contended, can I whois you? 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:04.560 And p. 0:00:06.760 --> 0:00:14.480 Noise um procession, assume process lucas pueblos aos. 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:30.440 This is Pablo Fajardo again, the Ecuadorian lawyer we heard 0:00:30.480 --> 0:00:33.280 from last time. He says, well, you have to understand 0:00:33.320 --> 0:00:36.400 what this trial, with everything about this case is that 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:40.880 it's not the lawyer's legal fight lalucha. The legal fight 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:44.640 is for los pueblos affrictaros, the towns that were affected, 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:47.479 the people who were affected. So it's not the lawyers, 0:00:47.880 --> 0:00:51.240 it's the people who were directly affected. That's what they're 0:00:51.280 --> 0:00:59.800 fighting for. This right here is the center of this story, 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:03.320 the heart. A lot of what has happened in the 0:01:03.440 --> 0:01:06.520 decade since the verdict in Ecuador has focused on the 0:01:06.640 --> 0:01:10.399 ins and outs of legal process things lawyers are doing 0:01:10.680 --> 0:01:13.680 far away from the oil pits in Ecuador. But at 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:17.480 its root, this case is about an environmental disaster, the 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:20.880 poisoning of a pristine jungle and the people living in it, 0:01:21.480 --> 0:01:23.800 and the fact that those people are still suffering the 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:30.440 consequences of what was done thirty forty years ago. May 0:01:30.480 --> 0:01:32.720 have picked up on this last time, but Fajardo and 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:36.600 Donziger are somewhat at odds these days, neither will say 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:42.360 exactly why that. There are a few possibilities on the table. First, 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:46.440 Fahardo is now also suing Petro Ecuador, the state owned 0:01:46.480 --> 0:01:50.080 oil company that Chevron has said is really responsible for 0:01:50.200 --> 0:01:54.160 the pollution in the Amazon. That case could feasibly be 0:01:54.280 --> 0:01:57.360 seen as a threat to the effort to collect on 0:01:57.520 --> 0:02:01.000 the Chevron judgment, and just as a case that somehow 0:02:01.160 --> 0:02:04.720 calls the Chevron case into question because it's holding Petro 0:02:04.800 --> 0:02:08.760 Ecuador accountable too, although Fajardo says, of course, yeah, they 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:11.560 both did things, they're both responsible, they should both be 0:02:11.680 --> 0:02:15.359 held to account. On the other side, Donziger has been 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:18.440 centered in a lot of the media coverage of this story, 0:02:18.919 --> 0:02:21.880 often more so than the damage done to Ecuador. That's 0:02:21.960 --> 0:02:25.040 not necessarily his fault. Sometimes it's just a function of 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:29.160 what's happened more recently and the fact that people are 0:02:29.160 --> 0:02:31.880 being assigned stories on him and can't get into the 0:02:31.960 --> 0:02:35.440 whole long history. But in either case it can and 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:43.320 has caused some resentment in Ecuador. Today, we're going to 0:02:43.400 --> 0:02:47.720 talk about why media coverage of this case started to 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:51.639 shift away from musuffiicpapos, those people in Ecuador who were 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:56.640 affected and towards the lawyers, because that was not an accident, 0:02:56.760 --> 0:02:57.720 that was a strategy. 0:02:58.320 --> 0:02:58.880 Think about it. 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:03.040 If your Chevron, you'd probably rather fight a Manhattan attorney 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:06.240 in the court of public opinion than thousands of indigenous 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:09.280 people who no longer have access to clean drinking water 0:03:09.520 --> 0:03:15.760 in the Amazon. When Chevron brought on Gibson Dunn in 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:18.720 late two thousand and nine, the firm had just finished 0:03:18.800 --> 0:03:21.359 up a case for Dole, the food company, and they'd 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:25.400 been really successful deploying what they called the quote unquote 0:03:25.720 --> 0:03:29.400 kill step, which worked to nullify a judgment against the 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:33.280 company that had come in Nicaragua. Basically, the lawyers had 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:37.480 convinced a US court that the case in Nicaragua was 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:41.400 a sham, part of a con that these plaintiffs, who 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:45.080 claimed they had been sterilized by a pesticide Dole used 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:49.160 on its banana plantation down there were frauds. Pretty quickly 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:52.600 after they started working on the Chevron case in Ecuador, 0:03:53.160 --> 0:03:56.280 the Gibson Dun lawyers were describing that case in fairly 0:03:56.360 --> 0:03:59.200 similar terms we heard in the last couple of episodes 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:02.520 about the various penis and depositions at Randy Mastro, the 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.080 lead attorney on the case for Gibson Dunn was getting. 0:04:05.360 --> 0:04:09.680 That all culminated in Chevron filing a civil racketeering suit 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:14.960 under RICO against the plaintiffs and attorneys in the Ecuador 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.680 case in twenty eleven. That came just a couple weeks 0:04:18.839 --> 0:04:24.200 before the verdict actually came down against Chevron in Ecuador. Remember, 0:04:24.279 --> 0:04:27.920 Stephen Donziger, the American attorney working on the case, told 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:31.200 us a while back that Chevron had stolen the moment 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:32.120 of that victory. 0:04:35.160 --> 0:04:37.440 So when the decision came down in Ecuador, I was 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:40.120 in New York with some of the lawyers in the 0:04:40.240 --> 0:04:42.600 US who had been working on the case, and we 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:45.280 got the news and we were obviously thrilled, but we 0:04:45.360 --> 0:04:47.720 were also at that point dealing with the Rico case, 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:52.000 so it was all confusing, and in a weird way, 0:04:52.200 --> 0:04:54.880 Chevron had stolen the moment. 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:58.440 And they'd stolen more than the moment. They'd taken control 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:02.240 of the story. From that point on, most coverage of 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:05.479 this case has focused on the legal ins and outs, 0:05:06.160 --> 0:05:10.400 not the original environmental damage in the Amazon. It became 0:05:10.680 --> 0:05:13.480 all about the lawyers and not the affected people at all, 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:17.000 And in general, that framing of the story has tended 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:21.559 to benefit Chevron. So what the heck was this reco case? 0:05:21.960 --> 0:05:25.800 What were the charges and what happened here? That story 0:05:25.920 --> 0:05:28.400 coming up right after this quick break. 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:48.440 Okay, let's be real. There are now a lot of 0:05:48.560 --> 0:05:51.920 daily news podcasts out there, but there's not one that's 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:55.440 anything like Today Explained from Fox. Every day, the team 0:05:55.480 --> 0:05:58.280 picks an essential news story that defines our moment, and 0:05:58.400 --> 0:06:01.600 then Sean Ramasa sits down with some of the world's 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:05.880 best journalists, academics, and policymakers to help us understand it. 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:08.240 The team recently took a look back at the ways 0:06:08.400 --> 0:06:12.159 in which our first reality TV president has fundamentally changed 0:06:12.200 --> 0:06:15.400 our reality in a special series called The Trump Years. 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:19.720 Today Explained really explains the news, all of it. Subscribe 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.800 if you haven't already, to Today Explained for free right 0:06:22.880 --> 0:06:26.240 now in your favorite podcast app to get new episodes automatically. 0:06:40.040 --> 0:06:43.440 The reco case filed against lawyers and some of the 0:06:43.520 --> 0:06:49.279 Ecuadorian plaintiffs in the Chevron Ecuador case was pretty damning. 0:06:49.720 --> 0:06:55.080 Charges sounded really bad. They included intimidating judges, tampering with evidence, 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:59.840 ghostwriting witness testimony, and even ghostwriting the final judgment itself. 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:04.680 But like everything else in this story, their RICO case 0:07:04.839 --> 0:07:06.560 was anything but straightforward. 0:07:07.240 --> 0:07:09.560 So my name is Melissa Simms, and I'm an attorney 0:07:09.600 --> 0:07:11.600 with Sanders Philips Grossman in New York. 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.840 We asked Melissa Sims, who's been involved in various RICO 0:07:16.000 --> 0:07:19.280 cases and is familiar with this case but has no 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:21.520 stake in it, to give us the lay of the 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:26.360 land on RICO in general and some of the particularities 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:29.760 of this case. To start with, what the heck is RICO. 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:35.240 It stands for Racketeer, Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, which 0:07:35.320 --> 0:07:37.440 is the law these cases are filed under. 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:40.760 It was passed initially in the nineteen seventies and intended 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:43.440 to pursue the mafia. What they tried to do is 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:46.240 establish a law to where you could tie all of 0:07:46.320 --> 0:07:49.560 their crimes together in one case and show them to 0:07:49.640 --> 0:07:53.680 be an enterprise, which allowed the prosecution to be able 0:07:53.760 --> 0:08:00.360 to connect a lot of different incidences into one enterprise, 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:05.120 to show that these people came together for a common 0:08:05.200 --> 0:08:09.920 purpose and that common purpose caused whatever type of damage. 0:08:10.000 --> 0:08:12.160 The way the RICO Statute is written, you can't just 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:14.880 bring a RICO charge against a group of people doing 0:08:15.040 --> 0:08:18.360 crimes together. The crimes have to be in service of 0:08:18.520 --> 0:08:19.800 some broader goal. 0:08:20.120 --> 0:08:22.360 Okay, so it can't just be you and I going 0:08:22.440 --> 0:08:24.400 to rob a bank. It has to be you and 0:08:24.480 --> 0:08:26.720 I going to rob a bank with the purposes of 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:30.640 taking the money to further some other type of conduct. 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:35.720 SIMS is a plaintiff's atorney, which means she's usually bringing 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:39.880 RICO complaints against large corporations on behalf of people who've 0:08:39.920 --> 0:08:42.839 been wronged in some way by the company's behavior. In 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:45.000 the past few years, for example, she's been working on 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:47.760 the big opioid cases where they were able to show 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:52.520 that pharmaceutical companies, distributors, and some doctors were knowingly getting 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:55.240 people hooked on prescription opioids. 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:59.400 Now that illegal conduct is one of a list of 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:04.559 conduct in the statute, so in the federal statue that 0:09:04.800 --> 0:09:11.960 has to be enumerated, like bribery, extortion, arson, robbery, kidnapping. 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:16.880 The most common is mail and wire fraud. So mail 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:19.199 and wire fraud are the ones that we fall back 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:22.520 on on our cases because you can show if there's 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:24.240 an intent to decease. 0:09:25.480 --> 0:09:27.959 That's all you need is an intent to deceive using 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:28.800 the US. 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:31.360 Mail or wire, and the wire would be money. You 0:09:31.440 --> 0:09:33.040 could also apply it to the internet. 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:37.640 Sim says for plaintiffs attorneys, the burden of proof can 0:09:37.720 --> 0:09:40.880 be really high to make a RICO claim stick to 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:44.920 get past a motion to dismiss, and she says, usually 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:47.560 with a RICO complaint, you have to show a long 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:49.120 pattern of behavior. 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:52.320 It's something that is more than just one or two times. 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:56.240 It has to be an ongoing event. There has to 0:09:56.320 --> 0:09:59.320 be more than two occasions in the last ten years 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:05.000 of these people that get together to perpetuate something that 0:10:05.120 --> 0:10:05.679 they could. 0:10:05.559 --> 0:10:09.319 Not do on their own, that didn't really happen in 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:09.880 this case. 0:10:10.440 --> 0:10:15.360 So, you know, going after a one or two event 0:10:15.880 --> 0:10:19.040 type of conduct that I think they're alleging in Chevron 0:10:19.280 --> 0:10:23.680 is that is really rare to be able to pass 0:10:23.720 --> 0:10:26.600 a motion to dismiss on a RICO claim. 0:10:27.160 --> 0:10:31.840 The other big anomalies here center around damages and a jury. Generally, 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:34.679 in a RICO suit, the whole point is damages. The 0:10:34.720 --> 0:10:38.160 people bringing the claim were damaged in some quantifiable way 0:10:38.400 --> 0:10:41.680 and they're seeking compensation. In fact, one of the reasons 0:10:41.800 --> 0:10:44.480 big companies have become a target for RICO cases is 0:10:44.520 --> 0:10:47.719 that plaintiffs can ask for what's called treble damages, so 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:51.000 three times the damages they'd be able to get in 0:10:51.080 --> 0:10:54.520 a simple liability case. When it filed its suits, Chevron 0:10:54.679 --> 0:10:58.199 did claim damages, but then shortly before the trial was 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:01.800 set to begin, they drop the damages claim. They made 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:05.599 it solely about blocking the Ecuadorian judgment from being collected 0:11:05.840 --> 0:11:06.520 in the US. 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:09.920 But it's weird because that's what Rico's all about, damages. 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:11.680 What good is it without damages? 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:15.360 Sims says, damages are the whole basis of Rico claims. 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:17.560 In general. She says it would be kind of pointless 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:20.520 to bring a reco case if you don't have any damages. 0:11:21.200 --> 0:11:24.160 But it may also explain why the plaintiff's request for 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:27.640 a jury trial was denied without damages, to assess there's 0:11:27.720 --> 0:11:35.719 not much need for a jury. This Rico case is 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:39.360 every bit. It's complicated and confusing as the original case 0:11:39.559 --> 0:11:41.760 in Ecuador. So we're going to spend a couple of 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:44.360 episodes going through it, not because we want to take 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:47.559 our eyes or ears off of what happened in Ecuador, 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:50.440 but because we think it's important to evaluate these claims 0:11:50.480 --> 0:11:53.640 transparently and to weigh them against the damage. At the 0:11:53.679 --> 0:11:56.640 heart of the original case, the environmental damage in the 0:11:56.720 --> 0:12:01.199 Amazon to explore this mismatch that filmmakers Joe Berlinger described 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:05.080 last time between what's legal and what's moral, to look 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:08.240 at where the focus of the story turned and figure 0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:11.720 out where we think it should be now. So first 0:12:11.800 --> 0:12:19.160 charge pressuring the Lago Agrio court and manufacturing evidence. When 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:22.080 we talked to Randy Mastro, the lawyer with Gibson Dunn 0:12:22.080 --> 0:12:24.959 who led this rico effort for Chevron, he talked a 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.880 lot about how much Donziger and the other plaintiffs attorneys 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:32.480 were trying to influence and pressure Ecuadorian judges, among various 0:12:32.520 --> 0:12:35.599 other pieces of evidence. Mastro pointed to outtakes from the 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:39.400 documentary crewed. Here he is talking about one scene in particular. 0:12:40.000 --> 0:12:43.960 He also is captured at a dinner. I mean's sitting 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:49.800 next to a woman who says to him, you know 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:51.760 the judge will be killed if he doesn't rule in 0:12:51.800 --> 0:12:55.559 your favor in this country, and don Zeger says, well, 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:59.000 I don't know about killed, but he thinks he will, 0:12:59.679 --> 0:13:01.400 which is just as good. 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:07.880 It sounds really shady what Mastro's describing, but trying to 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:11.360 make your case in the public so that it's unpopular 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.040 for a judge to rule against you. It's kind of 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:18.320 the entire basis of litigation PR which PR firms created 0:13:18.520 --> 0:13:22.559 four multinational corporations in the first place, and it's something 0:13:22.640 --> 0:13:26.160 a lot of companies, including various oil companies, have used 0:13:26.200 --> 0:13:32.160 to their benefit for years. Another scene Mastro described is 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:33.320 a bit more concerning. 0:13:34.160 --> 0:13:36.800 He's talking about mobilizing to put people in front of 0:13:36.880 --> 0:13:39.240 the courthouse, the thousand people in front of the courthouse, 0:13:39.280 --> 0:13:41.800 to pressure, and he's saying, literally, we have to pressure 0:13:41.800 --> 0:13:43.400 the judge. We have to make him know who's boss. 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:45.480 We have to make them know who's in control. We're 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:46.880 going to put a thousand people in front of the 0:13:46.920 --> 0:13:49.760 courthouse and we're going to mobilize. And there's even discussion 0:13:49.840 --> 0:13:55.320 of arming the thousand people, and some discussion about whether 0:13:55.400 --> 0:13:58.559 that is, you know, conspiracy and a crime. 0:13:58.800 --> 0:14:01.600 In the outtake, it's hard to tell whether the arming 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:04.600 part is serious. In this clip, you'll hear donze Grew 0:14:04.640 --> 0:14:08.120 described pulling together a bunch of protesters, which he describes 0:14:08.160 --> 0:14:11.920 as an heercito an army. Then Luisianza jumps in and 0:14:12.000 --> 0:14:14.880 says in Spanish, we're using the word army, but it's 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:17.680 not really an army. It's like a specialized group. 0:14:18.320 --> 0:14:24.800 Various march gra okay for moms, most appropriate, hersing prevalent. 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:32.040 As as a least. 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:37.000 Side. 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:41.880 A woman from Amazon Watch asks if it's possible these 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:45.200 videos might be subpoenaed and warns the group. 0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:59.320 I again put a subpoena. What about you, asked these guys. 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:07.320 I just wanted to know that it's illegal to conspire 0:15:07.400 --> 0:15:08.120 to break the law. 0:15:08.960 --> 0:15:12.200 In another shorter snippet from this scene that we found 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:25.600 on YouTube, Yansa says this, and so he's saying, and 0:15:25.680 --> 0:15:29.000 then if we need weapons, we can provide weapons. That 0:15:29.160 --> 0:15:32.280 does sound bad, although Yance is laughing a lot, so 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:35.600 it's hard to tell what the context was here. Remember 0:15:35.720 --> 0:15:38.920 this is thirty seconds taken out of what seems to 0:15:39.000 --> 0:15:42.040 be a fifteen minute or so scene, so we're not 0:15:42.200 --> 0:15:45.760 really sure how this particular segment was taken out, what 0:15:46.040 --> 0:15:49.120 was before and after it, how it might have been edited. 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:52.960 All we're seeing is this one part. It mostly sounds 0:15:53.040 --> 0:15:58.440 like people organizing a big protest. The manufacturing evidence part 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:02.040 of this section of the Ego complaint refers to the 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:05.960 two issues Mastro mentioned a couple episodes back, the Combucker 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:09.200 Report and the Cabrera report. Here he is explaining the 0:16:09.320 --> 0:16:12.520 issue with Charles Combacker, an expert for the plaintiffs. 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:17.840 When we compelled doctor Combacker's testimony in Georgia. What he 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:23.520 actually testified was that the report that Steve Donziger and 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:27.120 his Ecuadorian lawyers submitted to the court in Ecuador was 0:16:27.240 --> 0:16:32.400 not Combacker's conclusion that he had not in fast included 0:16:32.960 --> 0:16:38.080 that it was a significant environmental damage in the work 0:16:38.120 --> 0:16:38.800 that he had done. 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:42.480 Donziger and the plaintiffs denied this. They said Kmbucker had 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:46.600 been fired and his deposition was basically sour greeps. Then 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:51.480 there's the Kabrew report, which Mastro says the plaintiffs experts Douglas, 0:16:51.480 --> 0:16:53.880 Speltman and and mast ghost wrote. 0:16:54.560 --> 0:17:00.480 Here's Mastro, the supposedly independent expert in equita who had 0:17:00.520 --> 0:17:03.320 been appointed by the court to be an objective, independent 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:06.840 party in assessing environmental damage and how much there was 0:17:07.040 --> 0:17:13.280 and attributing it to parties if there were found to 0:17:13.400 --> 0:17:17.480 be environmental damage, that, in fact, that was not an independent, 0:17:17.560 --> 0:17:18.320 objective report. 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:21.920 It had been ghost written word for word by Stratus. 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:25.960 Donziger's explanation was that this was all perfectly normal, that 0:17:26.080 --> 0:17:28.800 the plaintiffs had asked for Cabrera to be appointed, and 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:32.639 that their experts helped to run analysis for his report. 0:17:33.160 --> 0:17:35.760 He talked about this a couple episodes ago, but here's 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:37.200 a little snippet to remind you. 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:42.240 Stratis did write or draft most of the Cabrera report. Cabrera, 0:17:42.640 --> 0:17:45.520 though review it, signed it. They worked together. There was 0:17:45.560 --> 0:17:49.240 a massive amount of information, you know, literally tens of 0:17:49.320 --> 0:17:52.680 thousands of chemical sampling results in any single individual would 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:56.280 never have the capacity to pull that together analyze it 0:17:56.880 --> 0:17:58.240 by himself or herself. 0:17:58.440 --> 0:18:02.679 Douglas Beltman, the scientist from Stratus Consulting, told sixty minutes 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:06.359 in no uncertain terms what he thought of Texico's practices 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:07.400 in the Amazon. 0:18:08.040 --> 0:18:08.760 It's a disgrace. 0:18:10.000 --> 0:18:14.200 They treated Ecuador like a trash heat He was named 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:17.320 as a defendant in the Rico too, and in his 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:22.200 initial deposition he said, quote, we didn't collect any data ourselves. 0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:24.600 We were only looking at the data that had been 0:18:24.720 --> 0:18:28.880 collected by others. According to Velpment, that included data collected 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:32.080 as part of the trial, including the judicial inspection data, 0:18:32.240 --> 0:18:36.879 where plaintiff experts and Chevron experts collected environmental data, and 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:41.199 Cabrera and his team also collected environmental data. When asked 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:44.720 why the plaintiff samples all seemed to be contaminated and 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:50.520 Chevron samples devoid of contamination, Veltman explained why, quote, Chevron 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:53.520 may have sampled farther away from the pits, and they 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:56.919 used a different analytical method from that of the plaintiffs. 0:18:57.480 --> 0:19:01.040 At one point, the attorney conducting the deposition ask, did 0:19:01.080 --> 0:19:03.879 you reach any conclusion about whether or not the environment 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:07.720 had been contaminated during Texico's work in the concession by 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:11.200 their work in the concession? And Veltman answers, quote that 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:15.680 conclusion is that Texico did cause environmental contamination as a 0:19:15.720 --> 0:19:21.800 result of their operations. Then the attorney asks, did you 0:19:21.880 --> 0:19:25.120 reach a conclusion as to whether or not Texco operations 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:29.159 in the concession complied with the industry standards in effect 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:32.280 at the time, And Beltman says, quote, the way that 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:36.760 Texco operated that oil field was substandard by industry practices. 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:40.960 They used practices that were common in the early nineteen hundreds, 0:19:41.080 --> 0:19:44.640 but by the time they were conducting operations in Ecuador, 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:48.280 these practices were not typically used, certainly in the US 0:19:48.520 --> 0:20:04.200 and in most places in the world. Now again, it's 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:08.080 the method of the report that's been called into question, 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:11.400 and in this case, in particular, the idea that Beltman 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:14.920 and his colleague and Maste wrote the report and that 0:20:15.040 --> 0:20:18.400 Cabrera just signed his name to it. And it's possible 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:22.639 that the plaintiffs and their attorneys and Beltman and Maste 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:28.920 should have been more transparent about Stratus's work with Cabrera. Ultimately, 0:20:29.000 --> 0:20:31.679 it seems like a mood point because both the Kombacher 0:20:31.960 --> 0:20:35.119 report and the Cabrera Report were thrown out by the 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:39.560 judge in Ecuador. In the final judgment, Judge Sombrano wrote 0:20:39.600 --> 0:20:43.400 that he had disregarded these reports because of the controversy 0:20:43.480 --> 0:20:47.200 swirling around them both, which begs the question why would 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:50.960 reports that were disregarded by the Ecuadorian court be used 0:20:51.040 --> 0:20:56.439 as proof that the case was fraudulent. According to Donziger's 0:20:56.480 --> 0:20:59.720 attorney for the Rico case, Zoe Littlepage, it was all 0:20:59.760 --> 0:21:01.000 a diversion tactic. 0:21:01.960 --> 0:21:05.800 We have seen a pattern in the last decade of 0:21:06.000 --> 0:21:11.640 defense lawyers starting to and mainly corporations, starting to attack 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:15.960 the lawyers personally and the advocates personally as opposed to 0:21:16.840 --> 0:21:20.200 the plaintiffs or dealing with the underlying issues, and it 0:21:20.280 --> 0:21:20.920 has been. 0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:22.639 A terrifying. 0:21:23.560 --> 0:21:27.600 Trend for most people in the bar that when you 0:21:27.800 --> 0:21:31.359 bring a case, you are putting yourself personally on the line, 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:35.280 not just representing your client. That's never really happened before. 0:21:35.640 --> 0:21:38.560 But Mastro was about to up the ante. Here's what 0:21:38.680 --> 0:21:39.920 he argued in court. 0:21:41.160 --> 0:21:43.880 So you asked me, did Sobrano say, didn't rely on Cabrero. 0:21:44.960 --> 0:21:48.560 Actually it's more complicated than that, because Sobrano didn't write 0:21:48.600 --> 0:21:49.360 his own judgments. 0:21:52.280 --> 0:21:56.720 Mastro's accusation is that the plaintiffs and their attorneys ghost 0:21:56.760 --> 0:22:00.920 wrote the final judgment. Donziger, the other plaintiff attorneys, and 0:22:01.040 --> 0:22:04.919 the plaintiffs themselves, of course say this is completely false. 0:22:05.720 --> 0:22:10.320 So let's look at how Mastro tried to make this case. First, 0:22:10.359 --> 0:22:13.480 two points to phrases that were found in the Ecuadorian 0:22:13.680 --> 0:22:18.600 legal team's files that were similar or exact to phrases 0:22:18.680 --> 0:22:24.439 found in the judgment. Suspicious maybe, but not necessarily proof. 0:22:26.760 --> 0:22:30.440 They never did find the smoking gun the final judgment 0:22:30.560 --> 0:22:35.000 itself on any devices or hard drives, and both their 0:22:35.119 --> 0:22:38.800 expert and a forensic expert hired by the Ecuadorian government 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:43.000 did find multiple drafts of the judgment on Zambrano's computer, 0:22:43.520 --> 0:22:48.560 which is consistent with him writing it himself. However, as 0:22:48.640 --> 0:22:51.520 with everything else in this case, each side thought that 0:22:51.680 --> 0:22:56.280 the existence of multiple drafts proved their point. Master bolsters 0:22:56.359 --> 0:22:59.960 his claims with two things. First, he points to Judge 0:23:00.080 --> 0:23:02.679 Sombrano's behavior at the Rico trial. 0:23:02.800 --> 0:23:05.480 When I crossed examined him and gave him a pop quiz, 0:23:05.800 --> 0:23:08.399 and he couldn't answer a single question right about the 0:23:08.520 --> 0:23:13.399 most central important elements in his judgments. Couldn't answer a 0:23:13.600 --> 0:23:15.280 single one correctly. 0:23:16.040 --> 0:23:18.640 And then he points to the testimony of a witness 0:23:18.880 --> 0:23:23.520 named Alberto Gheta. Gherra was, by his own admission, a 0:23:23.600 --> 0:23:26.880 corrupt judge in Ecuador. He claimed to have been part 0:23:26.920 --> 0:23:30.600 of this big conspiracy to ghostwrite the judgment who'd had 0:23:30.640 --> 0:23:39.680 a change of heart, and then his master put it flipped. Guerta, 0:23:39.760 --> 0:23:43.680 though changed his testimony in a few instances despite having 0:23:43.800 --> 0:23:47.880 been prepped by Chevron's attorneys. And that's what we'll dig 0:23:47.960 --> 0:24:02.200 into next week next time on Drill. 0:24:03.680 --> 0:24:06.280 Well, it was shocking, you know, we knew coming in 0:24:07.119 --> 0:24:13.119 that Chevron had gone and recruited and paid cash in 0:24:13.240 --> 0:24:17.600 a duffel bag to a judge who had been essentially 0:24:17.720 --> 0:24:21.000 disbarred in Ecuador for corruption and fraud. 0:24:22.080 --> 0:24:24.440 And you know, as an American. 0:24:24.040 --> 0:24:27.960 Lawyer, I just assumed that that sort of what sounded. 0:24:27.680 --> 0:24:31.440 Like a story, like a movie plot would be completely 0:24:31.880 --> 0:24:34.440 laughed out of an American footroot, that we would have 0:24:34.720 --> 0:24:38.480 a key witness in a trial be someone that Chevron 0:24:38.840 --> 0:24:41.080 had paid close to a million. 0:24:40.800 --> 0:24:46.000 Dollars too in either money or compensation or you know. 0:24:46.040 --> 0:24:48.040 They bought him a house, they gave him a job, 0:24:48.160 --> 0:24:50.879 they bought him cars, they paved his flights for him 0:24:50.920 --> 0:24:53.360 and his family to move out of Ecuador. They paid 0:24:53.359 --> 0:24:58.080 for the immigration lawyer to bring him here. They you know, 0:24:58.160 --> 0:25:01.440 and it all started with Chevron going up to a 0:25:01.920 --> 0:25:07.879 sketchy meeting with this former disbarred judge with a double 0:25:07.960 --> 0:25:09.000 bag full of cats. 0:25:12.560 --> 0:25:12.800 Thanks. 0:25:16.000 --> 0:25:20.640 Drilled is an original production of the Critical Frequency podcast Network. 0:25:21.119 --> 0:25:25.280 The show was created, reported, and written by me Amy Westerveldt. 0:25:25.600 --> 0:25:29.359 My co reporter this season is Karen Savage. Our editor 0:25:29.560 --> 0:25:34.080 is Julia Ritchie. The show's editorial consultant is Rika Murphy. 0:25:34.520 --> 0:25:40.320 Mixing and mastering by Mark Bush, Original score by b Beeman, 0:25:40.960 --> 0:25:44.800 fact checking by wodn Yan. Our artwork for this season 0:25:45.160 --> 0:25:49.119 was done by the super talented Matt Fleming special thanks 0:25:49.720 --> 0:25:53.480 to Trevor Gowan and Emily Gertz. If you are a 0:25:53.680 --> 0:25:57.640 Patreon subscriber, thank you. Your money is helping to make 0:25:57.720 --> 0:26:01.560 this season. And as a special thank you to Patreon members, 0:26:02.000 --> 0:26:07.000 we're providing a variety of benefits, including bonus content and 0:26:07.280 --> 0:26:11.000 early access to episodes in this season. If that sounds 0:26:11.040 --> 0:26:13.320 appealing to you, or you just want to support our work, 0:26:13.640 --> 0:26:17.040 go over to patreon dot com, slash drilled and sign up. 0:26:17.760 --> 0:26:20.800 We also have some merch associated with that. You can 0:26:20.840 --> 0:26:24.480