U.S. court discovery has become one of Chevron Corporation’s favorite tools to try to undermine the gargantuan environmental damages suit filed against the oil company by tribespeople in Ecuador for alleged pollution of the Amazon jungle.
Last summer, we suggested that Chevron’s then-inchoate discovery might be more significant than the failed effort to block discovery with the First Amendment, which the rest of the press was obsessing over. Since that time, the federal courts have indulged in a veritable orgy of rulings under 28 U.S.C. section 1782 — the once-obscure law that provides for U.S. discovery in aid of foreign proceedings. As this unprecedented discovery campaign reaches its later phases, it is time to take stock.
