Chevron is not judicially estopped from challenging the fairness of the Ecuadorean judicial system as it fights the enforcement of a multibillion-dollar environmental damage award, Judge Lewis A. Kaplan of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York has ruled.
Kaplan said that Chevron is not bound by statements made by Texaco more than 10 years ago in the Southern District and in the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where it won dismissal of environmental litigation on the grounds of forum non conveniens, in part by arguing the Ecuadorean courts were neither corrupt nor unfair.
