Supporters for disbarred attorney Steven Donziger staged a global Anti-Chevron Day rally at Union Square in Manhattan last week.
Donziger allegedly fabricated evidence and pressured scientific experts to pull off a pollution scam against the oil and gas company’s operations in Ecuador that resulted in a $9.5 billion award.
“I'm Ecuadorian although I was born here in Elmhurst and I know the Ecuadorian system,” said Joyce Sanchez Espinoza, a Democrat Queens County Committee member. “There's actually evidence that it was Chevron that bribed and bought for $2 million this guy to testify against Donziger. So, I don't know what bribery they're talking about. Who bought who?”
Protesters carried signs and a banner with Donziger's photo pasted on it stating 'Free Attorney Donziger,' 'Pay Up Clean Up,' and 'Chevron Lies.'
As previously reported, in 2014, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan of the New York Southern District ruled that Donziger had defrauded the judicial system in Ecuador with bribes, which the Second Circuit upheld on appeal.
“That court order for Chevron to pay $9.5 billion to Ecuador or to the Ecuadorian community still stands,” Espinoza told Legal Newsline. “It hasn't been appealed and we don't care how much they have gone to international courts. Ecuador is a sovereign country and we are here to remind everyone that they have to pay and clean the soil.”
Donziger has been under house arrest for nearly 600 days because he disobeyed court orders and, as a result, is potentially facing time in prison.
“What they're doing right now to Stephen Donziger really concerns me,” Espinoza said in an interview at the protest “If this is happening to a good man, a human rights lawyer, what else should we expect for our communities? This is one man being sued by a big company and the court is going against all the evidence. It's unbelievable.”
Although Donziger is being characterized as a human rights hero by Espinoza, Congressman Chip Roy wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland describing Donziger as failing to comply with lawful court orders and that the charges against him flow from his own course of conduct, not from the causes or persons he represented.
Roy was responding to an April 27 letter signed by Massachusetts Congressman James McGovern who is House Rules Committee Chair, Congressmembers Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman of New York, Maryland Congressmember Jamie Raskin, Missouri Congressmember Cori Bush, and Michigan Congressmember Rashida Tlaib in which they asked Garland to review the case.
“The judge in his case, Loretta Preska, has been photographed in the newspapers socializing with the special prosecutor Rita Glavin outside of the courtroom,” Espinoza added. “We are taxpayers. We deserve better. They're just taking advantage of voiceless people. We're here to say ‘no’ to this corrupted insane, crazy system.”
Earlier this month, Senior U.S. District Judge Preska denied Donziger's motion to dismiss criminal contempt charges against him, according to Reuters.
Over the weekend, Donziger tweeted that former presidential candidate Marianne Williamson and actress Susan Sarandon went on Hill TV to demand Biden's Attorney General stop Chevron-funded corporate prosecution.
“Thank you both—and to the growing global community that has risen up in support,” stated Donziger in his May 22 post.