Izvor: ScheerPost
Judge Loretta Preska, an advisor to the conservative Federalist Society, to which Chevron is a major donor, sentenced human rights attorney and Chevron nemesis Steven Donziger to six months in prison Friday for misdemeanor contempt of court after he had already spent 787 days under house arrest in New York.
Preska’s caustic outbursts — she said at the sentencing, “It seems that only the proverbial two-by-four between the eyes will instill in him any respect for the law” — capped a judicial farce worthy of the antics of Vasiliy Vasilievich, the presiding judge at the major show trials of the Great Purges in the Soviet Union, and the Nazi judge Roland Freisler who once shouted at a defendant,”You really are a lousy piece of trash!”
Donziger, a graduate of Harvard Law School, has been fighting against polluting American oil companies for nearly three decades on behalf of indigenous communities and peasant farmers in Ecuador. His samo “crime” was winning a $9.5 billion judgment in 2011 against Chevron for thousands of plaintiffs. The oil giant had bought Texaco oil company holdings in Ecuador, inheriting a lawsuit alleging it deliberately discharged 16 billion gallons of toxic waste from its oil sites into rivers, groundwater, and farmland. Since the verdict, Chevron has come after him, weaponizing litigation to destroy him economically, professionally, and personally.
Presuda je uslijedila dan nakon što je Donziger podnio zahtjev sudu da razmotri mišljenje Vijeće Ujedinjenih naroda za ljudska prava utvrdilo je da njegov kućni pritvor predstavlja kršenje međunarodnog zakona o ljudskim pravima. Vijeće UN-a za ljudska prava priopćilo je da se njegov kućni pritvor računa kao pritvor prema međunarodnom pravu i da je stoga nezakonito da sutkinja Preska traži dodatnih šest mjeseci zatvora. Amnesty International je također pozvao na hitno oslobađanje Donzigera.
Donziger i njegovi odvjetnici imaju dva tjedna da se žale na sudčev nalog da se Donziger odmah pošalje u zatvor. Preska je odbio Donzigerovu jamčevinu tvrdeći da postoji opasnost od bijega. Ako Savezni prizivni sud odbije Donzigerovu žalbu, on će ići u zatvor na šest mjeseci. Ironija, koju Donziger i njegovi odvjetnici nisu propustili, jest da bi viši sud mogao poništiti Preskinu presudu protiv njega, ali do trenutka donošenja te odluke on bi potencijalno već proveo šest mjeseci u zatvoru.
"Ono što sutkinja Preska pokušava učiniti jest prisiliti me da odslužim cijelu kaznu prije nego što drugostupanjski sud donese odluku", rekao mi je Donziger telefonom u ponedjeljak. "Ako drugostupanjski sud presudi u moju korist, još ću odslužiti kaznu, iako sam pred zakonom nevin."
Donziger, his lawyers have pointed out, is the first person under U.S. law charged with a “B” misdemeanor to be placed on home confinement, prior to trial, with an ankle monitor. He is the first person charged with any misdemeanor to be held under home confinement for over two years. He is the first attorney ever to be charged with criminal contempt over a discovery dispute in a civil case where the attorney went into voluntary contempt to pursue an appeal. He is the first person to be prosecuted under Rule 42 (criminal contempt) by a private prosecutor with financial ties to the entity and industry that was a litigant in the underlying civil dispute that gave rise to the orders. He is the first person tried by a private prosecutor who had ex parte komunikacije s optužnim sucem dok je taj sudac ostao (i ostaje) neizuzeti u kaznenom predmetu.
“No lawyer in New York for my level of offense ever has served more than 90 days and that was in home confinement,” Donziger told the court. “I have now been in home confinement eight times that period of time. I have been disbarred without a hearing where I have been unable to present factual evidence; thus, I am unable to earn an income in my profession. I have no passport. I can’t travel; can’t do human rights work the normal way which I believe I am reasonably good at; can’t see my clients in Ecuador; can’t visit the affected communities to hear the latest news of cancer deaths or struggles to maintain life in face of constant exposure to oil pollution. In addition, and this is little known, Judge [Lewis A.] Kaplan has imposed millions and millions of dollars of fines and courts costs on me. [Kaplan is the judge for Chevron’s lawsuit against Donziger; Preska is his handpicked judge for the contempt charges.] He has ordered me to pay millions to Chevron to cover their legal fees in attacking me, and then he let Chevron go into my bank accounts and take all my life’s savings because I did not have the funds to cover these costs. Chevron still has a pending motion to order me to pay them an additional $32 [million] in legal fees. That’s where things stand today. I ask you humbly: might that be enough punishment already for a Class B misdemeanor?”
Sutkinja Preska bila je nepokolebljiva.
“G. Donziger je proveo posljednjih sedam godina gurajući nos u američki pravosudni sustav,” rekao je Preska na saslušanju o kazni. "Sada je vrijeme da platiš sviraču."
The six-month sentence was the maximum the judge was allowed to impose; she ruled that his house arrest cannot be counted as part of his detention. From start to finish, this has been a burlesque. It is emblematic of a court system that has been turned over to lackies of corporate power, who use the veneer of jurisprudence, decorum, and civility to make a mockery of the rule of law.
When the law is neutered, judges become the enforcers of injustice. These corporate judges, who epitomize what Hannah Arendt called the banality of evil, now routinely make war on workers, civil liberties, unions, and environmental regulations.
Preska sent Jeremy Hammond to prison for a decade for hacking into the computers of a private security firm that works on behalf of the government, including the Department of Homeland Security, and corporations such as Dow Chemical. In 2011, Hammond released to the website WikiLeaks and Rolling Stone and other publications some three million emails from the Texas-based company Strategic Forecasting Inc., or Stratfor. The sentence was one of the longest in U.S. history for hacking and the maximum Preska could impose under a plea agreement in the case. I sat through the Suđenje Hammondu. Gledao sam kako Preska izbacuje žuč i prezir Hammond s klupe istim vitriolom kojim je napala Donzigera.
Preska je također zloglasna po svom dugom pravosudnom križarskom ratu kako bi prisilila njujorške državne škole da osiguraju besplatan prostor uz subvencioniranje poreza za evangeličke crkve temeljen na očito nelogičnim čitanjima Ustava.
The persecution of Donziger fits a pattern familiar to millions of poor Americans who are coerced into accepting plea deals, many for crimes they did not commit, and sent to prison for decades. It fits the pattern of the judicial lynching and prolonged psychological torture of Julian Assange and Chelsea Manning. It fits the pattern of those denied habeas corpus and due process at Guantánamo Bay or in CIA black sites. It fits the pattern of those charged under terrorism laws, many held at the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC) in Lower Manhattan, who cannot see the evidence used to indict them. It fits the pattern of the widespread use of Special Administrative Measures, known as SAMs, imposed to prevent or severely restrict communication with other prisoners, attorneys, family, the media, and people outside the jail. It fits the pattern of the extreme sensory deprivation and prolonged isolation used on those in our black sites and prisons, a form of psychological torture, the refinement of torture as science. By the time a “terrorist” is dragged into our secretive courts the bewildered suspect no longer has the mental and psychological capability to defend themselves. If they can do this legally to the demonized they can, and one day will, do it to the rest of us. The Donziger case is an ominous warning that the American legal system is broken.
Ralph Nader, koji je diplomirao na Pravnom fakultetu Harvarda, dugo je osuđivao zarobljavanje sudova i pravnih fakulteta od strane korporativne moći, nazivajući nacionalne odvjetnike i suce "unosnim kotačićima u korporativnom kotaču". Napominje da su nastavni programi pravnih fakulteta “izgrađeni oko korporativnog prava, korporativne moći, korporativnog zločina i korporativne obrane.”
Victor Klemperer, koji je 1935. otpušten s mjesta profesora romanskih jezika na Sveučilištu u Dresdenu zbog svog židovskog podrijetla, oštroumno je primijetio kako su nacisti isprva “promijenili vrijednosti, učestalost riječi, [i] učinili u zajedničku imovinu, riječi koje su prije koristili pojedinci ili male skupine. Zaplijenili su riječi za zabavu, zatrpali riječi i izraze i oblike rečenica svojim otrovom. Natjerali su jezik da služi njihovom užasnom sustavu. Pokorili su riječi i učinili ih svojim najjačim reklamnim alatom [Werebemittle], istovremeno najjavniji i najtajniji.” A kako je došlo do redefiniranja starih koncepata, primijetio je Klemperer, javnost je bila nesvjesna.
This redefinition of words and concepts has, as Klemperer witnessed during the rise of fascism, allowed the courts to twist the law into an instrument of injustice, revoking our rights by judicial fiat. It has seen the courts permit unlimited dark money into political campaigns under Građani Ujedinjeni, braneći naše novcem zasićene izbore kao pravo na peticiju vladi i oblik slobode govora. Sudovi su opozvali naše pravo na privatnost i legalizirali sveobuhvatni državni nadzor u ime nacionalne sigurnosti. Sudovi korporacijama priznaju prava pojedinaca, dok pojedince koji vode korporacije rijetko smatraju odgovornima za korporativni kriminal.
Vrlo malo pravnih odluka koje idu u prilog korporativnoj moći ima podršku javnosti. Korporacijskom paranju utrobe zemlje, stoga, sve više daju pokriće kršćanski fašisti, koji svoju bazu jačaju oko pobačaja, molitve u školama, oružja i razbijanja odvojenosti crkve od države. Ova se pitanja rijetko rješavaju u slučajevima pred federalnim sudovima. Ali oni odvlače pažnju baze od niza prokorporacijskih odluka koje dominiraju većinom sudskih spisa.
Korporacije kao što su Tyson Foods, Purdue, Walmart i Sam's Warehouse ulile su milijune u institucije koje indoktriniraju te kršćanske fašiste, uključujući Sveučilište Liberty i Pravni fakultet Patrick Henry. Oni financiraju Judicial Crisis Network i Američku gospodarsku komoru, koji su vodili kampanju za imenovanje Amy Coney Barrett u Vrhovni sud. Barrett se protivi pobačaju i pripada People of Praise, krajnje desnom katoličkom kultu koji prakticira "govorenje u jezicima". Ona i drugi ideolozi krajnje desnice neprijateljski su raspoloženi prema LGBTQ pravima. Ali nije to razlog zašto je toliko vole korporacije koje ne zanimaju abortus, LGBTQ jednakost ili pravo na oružje.
Barrett and the Christian fascists embrace an ideology that believes that God will take care of the righteous. Those who are poor, those who are sick, those who go to prison, those who are unemployed, those who cannot succeed in society do so because they have failed to please God. In this worldview there is no need for unions, universal health care, a social safety net or prison reform. Barrett je dosljedno presuđivao u korist korporacija prevariti radnike na koncertima za prekovremeni rad, dati zeleno svjetlo za vađenje fosilnih goriva i zagađenje i lišiti potrošače zaštite od korporativnih prijevara. Skupina pasa čuvara Odgovoran.SAD otkrila da se kao sutkinja okružnog suda Barrett "suočila s najmanje 55 slučajeva u kojima su se građani sukobili s korporativnim subjektima pred njezinim sudom i 76% vremena ona je stala na stranu korporacija."
The Christian fascists, allied with organizations such as the Federalist Society, under the Trump administration gave lifetime appointments to nearly 200 judges, roughly 23 percent of all federal judgeships. That included 53 to the nation’s appellate courts, the court immediately under the Supreme Court. The American Bar Association, the country’s largest nonpartisan coalition of lawyers, has rated many of these appointments as unqualified. There are currently six Federalist Society Supreme Court justices, including Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh, who Nader calls “a corporation masquerading as a human being.” Two Federalist Society Supreme Court justices, Clarence Thomas and the late Antonin Scalia, who was an original faculty advisor to the organization founded by conservative law students in 1982, were supported in the nomination process by Joe Biden.
Slaganje sudova s korporativnim marionetama, međutim, počelo je mnogo prije Trumpa. Proveli su ga i republikanska i demokratska administracija. Preska je imenovao republikanski predsjednik GW Bush. Međutim, sudac koji je prethodio Preski u slučaju Donziger, sudac Lewis A. Kaplan, bivši odvjetnik duhanske industrije koji je imao neobjavljena ulaganja u fondove s Chevron holdings, prema njegovoj javnoj objavi financijskih podataka, imenovao je demokratski predsjednik Clinton.
Ciljanje sudova bio je jedan od ključnih ciljeva Lewis Powell, korporativni odvjetnik kojeg je predsjednik Nixon kasnije uzdigao u Vrhovni sud. U Powellovom memorandumu Gospodarskoj komori iz 1971., nacrtu usporenog korporativnog puča koji se dogodio, pozvao je poslovne interese da u pravosuđe uvedu suce koji su naklonjeni korporacijama.
Sudovima u svim tiranijama dominiraju mediokriteti i lakrdije. Oni svoju intelektualnu i moralnu prazninu nadomještaju revnim pokoravanjem moći. Pretvaraju suđenja u sudnicama opera buffa, barem dok žrtvu ne okovaju i izguraju kroz vrata zatvorske ćelije. Oni pršte u zajedljivim tiradama osuđenima, čija se kazna nikada ne dovodi u pitanje i čija se krivnja nikada ne dovodi u pitanje.
"Počelo je kada je Texaco ušao u Ekvador u Amazonu 1960-ih i sklopio prijateljski dogovor s vojnom vladom koja je tada vladala Ekvadorom", rekao mi je Donziger za stupcu Pisao sam o njegovom slučaju prije godinu dana. “Tijekom sljedećih 25 godina, Texaco je bio ekskluzivni operater vrlo velikog područja Amazone koji je imao nekoliko naftnih polja unutar ovog područja, 1500 četvornih milja. Izbušili su stotine bunara. Stvorili su tisuće otvorenih, neobloženih jama za toksični otpad u koje su bacali teške metale i toksine koji su izašli iz zemlje tijekom bušenja. Vodili su cijevi iz jama u rijeke i potoke na koje su se lokalni ljudi oslanjali za vodu za piće, ribolov i prehranu. Oni su zatrovali ovaj netaknuti ekosustav, u kojem je živjelo pet autohtonih naroda, kao i puno drugih neautohtonih ruralnih zajednica. Došlo je do masovnog industrijskog trovanja.”
"Presuda je donesena, oko 18 milijardi dolara u korist pogođenih zajednica, što je najmanje potrebno za čišćenje stvarne štete i nadoknadu ljudima za neke od njihovih ozljeda", rekao mi je Donziger. “To je na kraju smanjeno u žalbenom postupku u Ekvadoru na 9.5 milijardi dolara, ali su to potvrdila tri žalbena suda, uključujući najviši sud Ekvadora. Bilo je potvrdio kanadski Vrhovni sud, gdje su Ekvadorci otišli izvršiti svoju presudu u jednoglasnom mišljenju 2015. godine.”
Chevron promptly sold its assets and left Ecuador. It refused to pay the fees to clean up its environmental damage. It invested an estimated $2 million to destroy Danziger. Chevron sued him, using a civil courts portion of the federal law famous for breaking the New York Mafia in the 1970s, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations, or RICO Act. Chevron, which has more than $260 billion in assets, hired an estimated 2,000 lawyers from 60 law firms to carry out its campaign, according to court documents. But the oil giant, which did not want a jury to hear the case, dropped its demand for financial damages, which would have allowed Donziger to request a jury trial. This allowed Judge Kaplan to decide the RICO case against Donziger alone. He found credible a witness named Alberto Guerra, an Ecuadorian judge, relocated to the US by Chevron at a cost of some $2 million, who claimed the verdict in Ecuador was the product of a bribe. Kaplan used Guerra’s testimony as primary evidence for the racketeering charge, although Guerra, a former judge, later admitted to an international tribunal that he had krivotvorio svoje svjedočenje.
John Keker iz San Francisca, jedan od Donzigerovih odvjetnika u tom slučaju, rekao je da se protivio 160 odvjetnika za Chevron a tijekom suđenja osjećao se “kao jarac privezan za stup”. Sudski postupak protiv Kaplana nazvao je "dickensovskom farsom" i "pokaznim suđenjem".
In the end, Kaplan ruled that the judgment in the Ecuadorean court against Chevron was the result of fraud. He also ordered Donziger to turn over decades of all client communication to Chevron, in effect eradicating attorney-client privilege, a backbone of the Anglo-American legal system with roots dating to ancient Rome. Donziger appealed what was, according to legal experts following the case, an unprecedented and illegal order. While Donziger’s appeal was pending, Kaplan charged him with misdemeanor criminal contempt for this principled stance — carrying a maximum sentence of six months — as well as his refusal to turn over his passport, his personal electronics and to refrain from seeking the collection of the original award against Chevron. When the U.S. attorney’s office declined for five years to prosecute his criminal contempt charges against the environmental lawyer, Kaplan, using an exceedingly rare judicial maneuver, imenovao privatnu odvjetničku tvrtku Seward & Kissel, da djeluje u ime vlade kako bi procesuirao Donzigera. Ni sudac ni odvjetnički ured nisu otkrili da je Chevron bio klijent tvrtke Seward & Kissel.
Kaplan je također prekršio utvrđeni protokol nasumičnog dodjeljivanja predmeta kako bi osobno dodijelio Presku, koji je bio član savjetodavnog odbora Federalističkog društva, grupe kojoj je Chevron bio raskošan donator, to hear the case. Kaplan had Preska demand Donziger post an $800,000 bond on the misdemeanor charge. Preska placed him under house arrest and confiscated his passport, which he has used to meet with attorneys around the world attempting to enforce the judgment against Chevron. Kaplan managed to have Donziger disbarred. He allowed Chevron to freeze Donziger’s bank accounts, slapped Donziger with millions in fines without allowing him a jury, forced him to wear an ankle monitor 24 hours a day and effectively shut down his ability to earn a living. Kaplan allowed Chevron to impose a lien on Donziger’s apartment in Manhattan where he lives with his wife and teenage son.
Ništa od ovoga ne bi iznenadilo one koji su na meti tiranije iz prošlosti. Ono što bi možda bilo iznenađujuće za mnoge Amerikance jest koliko je napredna postala naša vlastita korporativna tiranija. Donziger nikada nije imao šanse. Kao ni Julian Assange. Ovi suci, na kraju, nisu fokusirani na Donzigera ili Assangea, nego na nas. Pokazna suđenja kojima oni vode zamišljena su kao transparentno pristrana. Osmišljeni su za slanje poruka. Svi koji prkose korporativnoj moći i državi nacionalne sigurnosti bit će linčovani. Neće biti odgode jer nema pravde.
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