The battle between Chevron and Ecuadorean citizens seeking to collect an $18 billion environmental judgment from the oil giant rolled into the Second Circuit Friday on the issue of whether Southern District Judge Lewis Kaplan had the authority to block enforcement of the judgment anywhere in the world.
James Tyrrell of Patton Boggs, representing two of the victorious plaintiffs in the Lago Agrio litigation in Ecuador that produced the judgment Chevron claims was procured by fraud, told a three-judge panel that Judge Kaplan had prejudged the issues and should be ordered off the case before he proceeds with a November trial on whether to make his injunction permanent.
