LexMonitor

After a decade-long wait, years of motions and a five-week trial, Chevron was cleared of responsibility for the death and injuries of several villagers of the Ilaje tribe in Nigeria. In 1998, the villagers sailed out to the Parabe oil platform off of the coast of Nigeria to “peacefully protest” the oil company. Chevron, believing that this was more than just a peaceful protest, called the Nigerian military to stop them. The Nigerian military landed on the platform, injuring and killing several. The case is also being heard in state court in San Francisco, where the plaintiffs hope the outcome (they are looking for injunctive relief against future abuses from Chevron) will be different.

• “In a stinging rebuke to a small army of progressive American academics, journalists, foundation grantmakers, and others who’ve promoted the case for years, a San Francisco jury has cleared the Chevron Corporation of all liability in the civil suit filed by Larry Bowoto over violence on a Nigerian oil platform in 1998, which he sought to lay at the giant oil company’s door by way of the Alien Tort Statute.” – from Jury vindicates Chevron in Nigeria brutality case, at Point of Law
• “A federal jury in San Francisco has cleared Chevron of liability under the alien tort claims act for two murders committed by Nigerian soldiers. Chevron paid the soldiers and transported them to its drilling platform in the Niger delta.” – from Chevron off the hook for Nigeria murders, at Method
• “The shooting, which killed one protester and wounded others, was at the hands of Nigerian government troops that were fed, housed and paid by Chevron. And there lies the problem. The rebel groups have effectively put the Nigerian military and Chevron’s oil facilities in the same basket, seeing attacks on one as attacks on the other. When an oil company controls its own military, what does that mean to global stability, and the reputation of the U.S. in the world?” – from Chevron slides, for now, at Oil Watchdog
• Villagers-turned-plaintiffs came away completely empty-handed Monday as the seven-man, two-woman jury denied all of their claims, including those for torture and wrongful death. The case was one of the first brought in an American court under the Alien Tort Claims Act.” – from Jury finds Chevron not liable for villagers’ deaths in Nigeria, at The National Law Journal’s LA Legal Pad
• “The lawyer for a group of Nigerian villagers says he’ll appeal a U.S. court verdict that cleared Chevron in the shootings of protesters by Nigerian troops. A federal jury in San Francisco Monday found Chevron innocent of any responsibility in the 1998 incident in which Nigerian soldiers killed two of the protesters who had taken over a Chevron offshore oil rig.” – from Appeal planned in Chevron Nigeria lawsuit, at Times of the Internet
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