Court Halts $18 Billion judgement Against Chevron for “World’s Worst Environmental Disaster” http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/mar2011/2011-03-07-02.html

A New York court ruled Monday to halt enforcement of an $18 billion judgment imposed by an Ecuadorean court against oil giant Chevron for polluting the Amazon. U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan decided Chevron faced "irreparable" harm to its reputation. Critics insist any harm done to Chevron's reputation is well deserved. Between 1964 and 1990, Texaco—acquired by Chevron in 2001—drilled for oil in a remote region of Ecuador's Amazon rainforest and dumped 18 billion gallons of toxic sludge into the streams and rivers local people use for drinking, bathing, and fishing. Kaplan ruled the Ecuadorean judgment could not be enforced until a racketeering suit brought by Chevron against the indigents was decided. Karen Hinton, spokesperson for the Ecuadoreans called the ruling a “slap in the face” to those who have “fought for 18 years to hold Chevron accountable for committing the world's worst environmental disaster."