Handing over the gavel: Judge Juan Nunez allowed to step down from Chevron case in Ecuador.
Court does about-face on Chevron judge
A court in Ecuador has said it will let a judge overseeing a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against US supermajor Chevron recuse himself from the case after initially denying his request.
Judge Juan Nunez had tried to step down after Chevron claimed it had video evidence that he was prejudiced against the company.
Nunez said the tapes had been doctored to implicate him but still submitted his request to be removed from the case.
That request had initially been rejected by Judge Nicolas Zambrano, who said Nunez did not provide enough evidence to support his request.
Now, the courts have recanted and allowed Nunez to leave the case, according to an Associated Press report, which cited plaintiff’s attorney Pablo Fajardo.
Fajardo said Zambrano was again in line to preside over the 16-year-old case, which pits inhabitants of Ecuador’s Amazon region against the US oil company.
The plaintiffs are seeking as much as $27 billion to clean up toxic oil waste that they say has sickened and killed people.
The mess was left after joint operations by Texaco and Ecuadorean state-run Petroecuador.
Chevron, which bought Texaco in 2001, claims it has already paid for its share of the cleanup and that it was released from further liability by the Ecuadorean government.