Chiquita
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6 24 court case eric holder?
chiquita Brands International Inc. bananas are arranged at Union Street Produce Co. in San Francisco, California.
Banana giant Chiquita Brands will need to pay $38.3 million to family members of those killed during Colombia’s bloody Civil War after the company was found liable for funding a right-wing paramilitary group.
The verdict was handed down on Monday by a jury in West Palm Beach, Florida. The landmark ruling is the first time a major U.S. company has been found guilty of human rights abuses in another country.
“The verdict sends a powerful message to corporations everywhere: profiting from human rights abuses will not go unpunished. These families, victimized by armed groups and corporations, asserted their power and prevailed in the judicial process,” said Marco Simons, general counsel at EarthRights International, a nonprofit representing victims in the case, in a statement.
The trial included testimony from families of the nine victims, including expert reports, and key documentary evidence.
Chiquita, which is headquartered in Florida, said in statement following the verdict that “the situation in Colombia was tragic for so many,” adding, “however, it does not change our belief that there is no legal basis for these claims.”
According to court documents, Chiquita agreed to pay a $25 million fine to the the U.S. government in 2007 after it admitted that it had paid about $1.7 million between 1997 and 2004 to the United Self-Defense Forces of Columbia (AUC). The AUC was labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S. in 2001.
Chiquita has faced similar suits filed in U.S. courts from families of other victims that were killed by the paramilitary group, which the company also paid.
The court’s latest verdict follows a weeks-long trial, including a jury selection period that began in April, EarthRights said, adding that its case was originally filed in July 2007 and was later combined with several other cases.
“It’s a triumph of a process that has been going on for almost 17 years, for all of us who have suffered so much during these years,” one of the victims said in EarthRights’ press release. “We’re not in this process because we want to be; it was Chiquita, with its actions, that dragged us into it. We have a responsibility to our families, and we must fight for them.”
Chiquita jury verdict in Colombia paramilitary killings case awards millions : NPR
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Explore in depth(6 more articles)
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http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/200151-keystone-supporters-go-bananas-over-chiquitas-no-oil-sands-pledge
eri
supreme Court Allows U.S. Corporation to Finance Terrorism Without Accountability
The United States Supreme Court announced today that it will not hear Cardona v. Chiquita Brands International, a lawsuit on behalf of victims of terrorism and crimes against humanity in Colombia. This landmark case could have decided whether U.S. courts can hold corporations accountable for human rights abuses they commit abroad under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), a federal law that allows foreigners to sue for violations of international human rights law. By declining to hear the case, the Supreme Court has created yet another obstacle in the path of victims seeking remedies for abusive corporate actions abroad, and allows a U.S. corporation to get away with financing terrorism without accountability to its victims in U.S. courts.
EarthRights International (ERI) represents Colombians who were tortured and whose relatives were murdered by paramilitary death squads financed by Chiquita. From 1997-2004, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, or AUC), used Chiquita’s financial support to spread fear in the banana-growing region of Urabá, Colombia. The AUC tortured and killed thousands of villagers, labor leaders, and community organizers who were suspected of favoring leftist guerrillas or making trouble for the plantation owners.
Among the plaintiffs is Jane Doe 5, whose husband John Doe 9 was a labor union president from the banana growing region of Urabá. The complaint alleges that the AUC detained, tortured, killed and dismembered John Doe 9 in retaliation for his union activities, and that “Chiquita benefited from the death of John Doe 9 by removing a labor activist who threatened the stability and profitability of Chiquita’s operations.” In total, the families of over 4,000 victims of paramilitary violence in the banana-growing regions of Colombia are suing Chiquita, and all believe that the deaths and torture benefited Chiquita by suppressing labor organizers and community leaders who might have driven up labor costs or supported Chiquita’s political opponents.
Families of the victims filed a petition to the Supreme Court in December 2014 after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit dismissed their ATS claims last July. The Eleventh Circuit held that despite the fact that Chiquita is a U.S. company that made decisions in the U.S. to finance paramilitary death squads, in violation of U.S. criminal law, the victims’ claims under the ATS lacked sufficient connection to the United States to be heard in U.S. courts.
For human rights advocates around the world, this decision is particularly baffling considering Chiquita admitted to paying the paramilitaries in response to a U.S. government investigation. In 2007, Chiquita pled guilty to federal criminal charges for providing material support to the terrorist group, the only corporation ever convicted of this crime. In its statement during Chiquita’s sentencing hearing, the U.S. Department of Justice expressed concern for the innocent Colombians who were killed by the bullets that Chiquita’s money bought, but their families have seen no remedies thus far.
Despite the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the ATS claims, parts of the Cardonacase continue in a federal district court in Florida. Yet after eight years in the courts, there is still no end in sight. “Justice for John Doe 9’s family and all the other victims of Chiquita’s human rights violations is long overdue,” says Marco Simons, ERI’s General Counsel. “We will do everything we can to bring this case to trial so Chiquita and its executives can answer for their decision to put profit before human life.”
The case at the Supreme Court isCardona v. Chiquita Brands Int’l, Inc., Docket No. 14-777, which includes the class action John Doe I v. Chiquita, originally filed in 2007 with several other Chiquita cases and coordinated as No. 08-MD-01916 in the Southern District of Florida. In addition to ERI, counsel for the plaintiffs include Schonbrun DeSimone Seplow Harris & Hoffman LLP, Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, Judith Brown Chomsky, Arturo Carrillo, and John DeLeon.
death squads 2007
...The Cincinnati-based fruit company Chiquita was sued Thursday for funding, arming and supporting terrorist organizations in Colombia. The human rights groups EarthRights International filed the class action lawsuit on behalf of six Colombians whose relatives had allegedly been murdered by a Colombian paramilitary group that was partially funded by Chiquita.
The lawsuit alleges that the banana giant funneled money and guns to a rightwing death squad that murdered thousands of people and shipped untold amounts of cocaine to the United States.
Part of the lawsuit is not in dispute. Earlier this year Chiquita admitted one of its subsidiaries paid about $1.7 million to the rightwing paramilitary group United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, which is also known as the AUC. The group is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department. Chiquita also agreed to pay the U.S. government a $25 million fine.
At the time Chiquita defended its actions saying it fell victim to an extortion racket that threatened its employees....
http://www.democracynow.org/2007/7/20/relatives_of_colombia_death_squad_victims
Read Dan Kovalik's original post from 11/6/08, below:
In its recent report entitled, "Breaking the Grip? Obstacles to Justice for Paramilitary Mafias in Colombia," Human Rights Watch (HRW) had specific recommendations for the U.S. Department of Justice. Specifically, HRW recommended that, in order to assist with the process of ending the ties between the Colombian government and paramilitary death squads, the U.S. Department of Justice should, among other things, "[c]reate meaningful legal incentives for paramilitary leaders [a number of whom have already been extradited to the U.S.] to fully disclose information about atrocities and name all Colombian or foreign officials, business or individuals who may have facilitated their criminal activities," and "[c]ollaborate actively with the efforts of Colombian justice officials who are investigating paramilitary networks in Colombia by sharing relevant information possible and granting them access to paramilitary leaders in U.S. custody."
Do not expect these recommendations to be carried forward if Eric Holder decides to forgo his lucrative corporate law practice at Covington & Burling and accept the U.S. Attorney General position for which many believe he is the top contendor. Eric Holder would have a troubling conflict of interest in carrying out this work in light of his current work as defense lawyer for Chiquita Brands international in a case in which Colombian plaintiffs seek damages for the murders carried out by the AUC paramilitaries - a designated terrorist organization. Chiquita has already admitted in a criminal case that it paid the AUC around $1.7 million in a 7-year period and that it further provided the AUC with a cache of machine guns as well.
Indeed, Holder himself, using his influence as former deputy attorney general under the Clinton Administration, helped to negotiate Chiquita's sweeheart deal with the Justice Department in the criminal case against Chiquita. Under this deal, no Chiquita official received any jail time. Indeed, the identity of the key officials involved in the assistance to the paramilitaries were kept under seal and confidential. In the end, Chiquita was fined a mere $25 million which it has been allowed to pay over a 5-year period. This is incredible given the havoc wreaked by Chiquita's aid to these Colombian death squards.
According to Mario Iguaran, the Attorney General of Colombia, Chiquita's payments to the AUC paramilitaries led to the murder of 4000 civilians in the banana region of Colombia and furthered the growth of the paramilitaries throughout Colombia and their violent takeover of numerous Colombian regions. Iguaran, in response to the claims of both Chiquita and Eric Holder himself that Chiquita was somehow forced to pay "protection" to the paramilitaries (see, Washington Postand Conde Nast Portfolio), stated unequivocally that "[t]his was not payment of extortion money. It was support for an illegal armed group whose methods included murder."See, Christian Science Monitor, "Chiquita Case Puts Big Firms on Notice."