Profile: Angel, Father of Six Who Died of Cancer from Chevron's Contamination

The Chevron Pit blog has posted the latest installment in a series of stories about how Chevron's contamination in Ecuador's rainforest region has impacted the people living near the former oil sites. The photos and testimonials are from the book 'Crude Reflections' by photographers Lou Dematteis and Kayana Szymczak.

This latest story is about Luz Maria Martin and her late husband Angel Toala. They lived – and Luz and their family continues to live – in the Shushufindi area of the Ecuadorian Amazon, near an oil pumping station and only 200 yards from an oil well. Shushufindi is the name of a small town in the northeast of Ecuador, as well as the name of the largest oil field in Ecuador's Oriente Basin, discovered by Chevron-owned Texaco in 1970.

Luz and Angel moved with their six children to the Shushufindi area for work. But Angel developed stomach cancer, and by the time it was diagnosed, it was too late. Photographer Lou Dematteis and journalist Joan Kruckewitt conducted the interview with his widow Luz.

An excerpt from the interview:

I don’t think the oil company (Texaco) worried if they contaminated the water. We farmers didn't realize the water was contaminated, and certainly it was not in the oil company’s interest to tell us that.

Angel Toala at his home in Shushufindi shortly before succumbing to stomach cancer. Photo by Lou Dematteis.

Transcription of interview with Luz Maria Martin, widow of Angel Toala, who died of stomach cancer:

My husband, Angel Toala, and I came here to the Amazon 23 years ago from the mountains of San Domingo. We came because he was told you could earn good money with the [oil] companies here. We have six children.

Angel worked on the pipeline for Texaco for five years, and that’s how we’ve been able to buy this farm. Mostly we grew coffee, plantains, yucca, some cacao.

There’s a [Texaco] pumping station near our house and a [Texaco] oil well 200 yards from our house, and downstream is a lake where the crude oil they dumped gathers. We never let the animals drink the water. A lot of times we found dead fish in it. Our coffee plants there turned yellow and died.

We got our drinking water from the rain, and, when it didn’t rain, from the stream. It had a funny taste and sometimes you could see oil floating on top. We bathed there and washed our clothes there. We knew the water was bad for our health, but what could we do? There wasn’t water anywhere else.

About three years ago, my husband started having stomach pains, slight pains when he ate. He couldn’t eat as much as he used to. (Crying) Certain foods made him feel bad, and he couldn’t eat meat, or fish. About a year ago he started losing weight.

(Crying) Then his back began hurting, and his muscles. He felt tired. At the end, he couldn’t take the sun. He was so tired; he didn’t have any energy.

In Quito he was diagnosed with stomach cancer. We took him to the Eugenio Espejo Hospital but the doctors said that it was too late; nothing could be done.

(Crying) The last three months before he died, he couldn’t do anything. He just lay in the hammock.

Angel Toala at home in Shushufindi. Photo by Lou Dematteis from Crude Reflections.

Judge Allows Arbitration in Chevron-Ecuador Battle – Environmental Lawsuit Not Directly Affected

Yesterday, U.S. District Court Judge Leonard Sand declined to stay international arbitration sought by Chevron in complaints against the Republic of Ecuador. After repeatedly asserting that there need be only one claim that is arbitrable in Chevron's complaint, Judge Sand dismissed Ecuador's motion to stay the arbitration under the U.S.-Ecuador Bilateral Investment Treaty. Sadly, Judge Sand's ruling may mean more delay in getting relief for the 30,000 people in Ecuador affected by Chevron's massive contamination of their rainforest home, but this was a battle between the oil giant and Ecuador, and does not directly affect the lawsuit originally brought by Ecuador's indigenous people to force Chevron to clean up its toxic mess.

For years in the 1990s, Chevron argued in the same court to have the environmental lawsuit – originally filed in 1993 in New York against Chevron-owned Texaco – sent to Ecuador. Chevron made repeated commitments to the District Court to be subject to jurisdiction in Ecuadorian courts, and satisfy any judgment in the case, reserving its rights to challenge the verdict only in a very clearly-defined way – under what the judge and lawyers in the courtroom this week referred to as "CPLR 5304." Section 5304 of the New York State Civil Practice Law and Rules (CPLR) sets forth grounds for challenging a "foreign judgment," if an entity believes it did not receive due process of law, for instance. Breaching the commitments it repeatedly made to the District Court – and mandated by the Circuit Court of Appeals – Chevron is "jumping the gun," according to one of the lawyers for Ecuador, and in the final stages of the 17-year lawsuit, trying to find another way to evade responsibility for its environmental devastation of Ecuador's rainforest region.

After the decision, Steven Donziger, a U.S. lawyer for the plaintiffs, said:

"We have explained to the court why we believe Chevron is trying to undermine the rule of law in both the U.S. and Ecuador by taking the litigation over the world's worst oil-related disaster to a secret arbitration where the victims of the company's misconduct cannot appear. This end-run maneuver is just the latest chapter in a long pattern of abuse by Chevron when it comes to the indigenous people of Ecuador. At the end of the day, a public court will decide the claims of the victims and if they receive a favorable judgment against Chevron we expect to enforce it in countries where the company has assets."

As the verdict in the trial is expected within months, Chevron is increasingly desperate to find any way to escape a huge liability in the case. Judge Sand, the same judge who declined Ecuador's motion to stay the international arbitration yesterday, ruled against Chevron's motion to take the case to arbitration in 2007. And while ruling for Chevron, Judge Sand opened on the first day of the hearing by asking Chevron why its previous representations and agreements with the court didn't preclude it from arbitration. Before issuing his ruling, the judge also said that he was skeptical of the timing of Chevron's move, likely coming just ahead of a verdict in the marathon 17-year court battle.

As the Associated Press reported:

"[Judge Sand's] ruling does not directly affect the lawsuit Chevron is fighting in Ecuador, where a court-appointed expert has recommended the oil company pay up to $27 billion for environmental damages and related illnesses."

In fact, the judge's decision has nothing to do with the merits of the case against Chevron and the staggering mountain of evidence that shows Chevron's unambiguous responsibility for massive oil contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon. This is just Chevron's latest legal maneuver to try to evade responsibility for the toxic legacy it left behind in Ecuador that continues to cause suffering, sickness, and death for men, women and children in the indigenous and campesino communities throughout Ecuador's rainforest region.

Today, the Republic of Ecuador's Attorney General Diego Garcia said that Ecuador is considering appealing the decision. And today, the frustrating results of the latest courtroom skirmish are likely trickling through the rainforest communities, like the rainbow-colored slicks of oil that still course their rivers and streams.

– Han

Han Shan is the Coordinator of the Clean Up Ecuador Campaign.

Chevron Faces Critical Hearing in Last-Ditch Effort to Escape Ecuador Trial

Today, oil giant Chevron will appear in federal court in New York to defend a last-ditch and likely futile effort to escape a trial in Ecuador. Chevron wants to take the case to binding arbitration under the U.S.-Ecuador Bilateral Investment Treaty, where the Amazon rainforest communities who are plaintiffs in the lawsuit would not be able to appear.

Today's hearing is before Judge Leonard B. Sand, who handed Chevron a defeat in 2007, permanently staying the company's first attempt at arbitration. Jonathon Abady, an American lawyer representing the rainforest communities in the federal court action, says, "Chevron acts like a fugitive from justice in Ecuador because the evidence establishing the company’s misconduct is overwhelming."

According to a press release from the Amazon Defense Coalition (ADC), which represents the 30,000 indigenous people and campesinos who are suing Chevron for clean-up of massive contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon, the oil giant is:

trying to abandon the trial even though over the last seven years the parties have produced more than 64,000 chemical sampling results, conducted 103 court-supervised inspections of former Chevron well sites scattered throughout the rainforest, and created a trial record than runs to more than 200,000 pages.

Read the rest of the ADC press release.

– Han

Han Shan is Coordinator of the Clean Up Ecuador Campaign

After Visit to CA: Personal Video Message from Emergildo Criollo to Chevron CEO John Watson

Readers of this blog may be somewhat familiar with Emergildo's story by now – an indigenous leader from the Cofan nation in Ecuador's Amazon, he first encountered Texaco's helicopters landing in his pristine rainforest home to drill for oil in 1964. About a decade later, his first two sons had died from sickness due to oil contamination and his wife has since suffered uterine cancer. He tells a tragic story of environmental devastation, cultural loss, and human suffering. But his story is also one of perseverance, courage and resilience as he continues to fight for clean up of Chevron/Texaco's contamination and bravely demands justice for his people and the thousands of others who have suffered from Chevron's callous neglect and greed.

Last week, Emergildo traveled to California, to pay a visit to Chevron CEO John Watson at his home, bearing a letter signed by himself, other indigenous nationalities in Ecuador, and the Amazon Defense Coalition, which represents the 30,000 plaintiffs in a monumental lawsuit demanding environmental clean-up from Chevron. Mr. Watson didn't answer the call so Emergildo headed to Chevron's headquarters in San Ramon and once again asked for Watson, only to be received by Chevron public relations executives, who accepted his letter as well as over 325,000 supporting petitions from more than 150 countries around the world.

After delivering his letter and the petitions, Emergildo recorded this personal video message to John Watson:

Pollution, Sickness, and Death: Interview with Indigenous Leader Emergildo Criollo from the Ecuadorian Amazon

Online news magazine Alternet has a powerful interview with Cofan indigenous leader Emergildo Criollo, who was in the San Francisco Bay Area last week to pay a visit to Chevron and its new CEO John Watson. Though Watson refused to accept Emergildo's letter appealing to him to clean up Chevron's toxic contamination of his rainforest home, Emergildo spoke forcefully to Chevron executives, lawmakers in the State Capitol, allies, and news media. In his powerful interview with Cameron Scott, Emergildo says:

We've gotten exactly three things from the company: pollution, sickness and death; that's it.

In the interview, Emergildo describes the impacts of Chevron on his community and culture beyond the pollution, gives an overview of the history of the lawsuit against the oil company, and punches holes in Chevron's shift-the-blame talking points. Read the full interview here.