Kaplan, the contempt charges were rejected by the regular federal prosecutor in New York. Donziger to be held in criminal contempt of court after he appealed an apparently unlawful order that he turn over his computer and cell phone to the company–devices that contain highly sensitive and confidential attorney-client information.įiled by Judge Lewis A. The judgment has been affirmed for enforcement purposes by 29 appellate judges, including the entire Supreme Courts of Ecuador and Canada.Īfter having insisted for years that the trial take place in Ecuador, Chevron’s lawyers later vowed never to pay the judgment and have threated the Indigenous groups with a “lifetime of litigation” if they don’t drop their claims. Seward’s brazen push to punish lawyers who challenge its corporate clients puts it as the top of this list.ĭonziger was instrumental in helping Indigenous peoples and rural farmers in Ecuador’s Amazon win the pollution judgment against Chevron in 2011 after the company was found liable for dumping 16 billion gallons of cancer-causing oil waste onto Indigenous ancestral lands. No matter what type of employment we will seek after law school, we must avoid firms involved in this assault on human rights lawyering. “We are horrified by the precedent this corrupt prosecution sets,” said Elias Schultz, a Stanford law student who also organized the letter. “This injustice affects all of us,” added Rocchi.Īs members of the legal community, we feel obliged to take a stand. Seward & Kissel’s behavior is an embarrassment to our courts, the legal profession, and the United States’ global image. Human rights violations are happening in plain sight in New York City. “We are proud to stand in solidarity with Steven Donziger in the face of this unprecedented assault by Chevron and its allies.” said Catherine Rocchi, the president of Stanford’s Environmental Law Society. and international law by international lawyers who serve on a trial monitoring committee that is tracking the case. history and has been called a violation of U.S. Donziger is thought to be the first corporate criminal prosecution in U.S. Donziger in the name of the government even though it has a client relationship with Chevron and even though the charges were rejected by the U.S. Shockingly, the Seward firm is prosecuting Mr. The letter was organized at Stanford and several other law schools that Seward & Kissel relies on as a pipeline for new hires. Donziger’s unprecedented 18-month pre-trial detention on misdemeanor contempt charges. human rights attorney Steven Donziger,” the students wrote in a letter with signatories representing 52 law schools.ĭespite a significant conflict of interest, Seward & Kissel continues to drive Mr. “We pledge to boycott Seward & Kissel recruitment activities in response to the firm’s unethical prosecution of U.S. human rights lawyer Steven Donziger after he helped win a $9.5 billion pollution judgment against Chevron. law schools–including Stanford, Harvard, Yale, and New York University–have announced a recruiting boycott of a prominent Chevron law firm to protest its “unethical” private prosecution of U.S. New York–Students from over 50 leading U.S.
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