The Chevron Shakedown moves to Canada

Those of you who have been reading Hot Air for a while know that we’ve been covering the Chevron Shakedown since January of 2011. After several years and who knows how many millions of dollars in court costs, the would be pickpockets who sought billions of dollars from the energy giant were utterly defeated in the court of law. To put the cherry on the cake, the chief American architect of the attempted fraud was brought in successfully on RICO charges.

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As the old saying goes, though, if it first you don’t succeed in ripping off The Man, try, try again. It seems that more than a few people missed the memo on what happened in the US court system and are now moving forward with a similar effort they’ve been trying to get going over the last couple years to pull the same stunt in the Great White North, as reported by Peter Foster in the Financial Post.

Not only have the Usual Greener-than-thou Suspects such as Danny Glover, Mia Farrow, and Trudie Styler (Mrs. Sting) taken up the cause, but the Canadian Union of Public Employees, CUPE, has also recently joined the fray, along with grandstanding Toronto City councillor Joe Mihevc, and local NGO rentamobs. That’s because this smelly carcass of a suit has washed up in Canada.

Whether the shakedown can be pursued in Ontario is due to come before the Supreme Court of Canada by year end. An Ontario court originally ruled that while there might be jurisdictional grounds for allowing the case (a ruling which said nothing about the merits of the case itself), such an exercise would be a waste of judicial time. That judgment was overturned on appeal, leading to Chevron’s successful request for a Supreme Court ruling.

Assuming they are similar to the unions in the United States, I suppose I can see how the CUPE decided to jump on this train. But has anyone spoken to Danny Glover, Mia Farrow and Trudie Styler to let them know what happened in New York? Are they aware of the financial beating that Steven Donziger and his firm received and the ruinous revelation of the fraud and corruption at the heart of this suit which were exposed? If this was an issue that Chevron planned to fold up on and write a check to avoid a major nuisance, they would have done so long before this. It’s highly unlikely that they’re going to turn tail at this point, particularly when you consider the mountain of documented information they now have at their disposal to bring to bear in Ontario.

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But who knows? I have very little experience covering the courts in Canada. Perhaps the green lobbyists and eco-warriors have a lot more pull up there and they think they have a shot at collecting a payday. (Or, in the case of the celebrity guest stars, getting some headlines to show how they are fighting for the health of Gaia.) If that’s the case, we may be on to a multi-year, round two of this epic tale. Stay tuned.

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