Embattled attorney Steven Donziger announced Tuesday that he has retained two trial lawyers to defend him against allegations that he rigged a $19 billion environmental judgment against Chevron Corporation in Ecuador. The duo, Richard Friedman of Seattle-based Friedman Rubin and Zoe Littlepage of Houston-based Littlepage Booth, will not have much time to prepare. A bench trial opens before Southern District Judge Lewis Kaplan (See Profile) on Oct. 15 in Chevron’s fraud and racketeering case against Donziger.
For the last five months Donziger has been representing himself pro se, with occasional help from Aaron Page of the Washington D.C.-based human rights law firm Forum Nobis. Donziger’s last attorney, John Keker of Keker & Van Nest, bowed out of the case in May. Keker wrote in his lengthy withdrawal motion that Chevron’s case against Donziger had “degenerated into a Dickensian farce” because of Chevron’s “scorched earth” tactics and Kaplan’s “implacable hostility.”
