Felon Involved in Clandestine Videos of Ecuador Judge in Chevron Case

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Felon Involved in Clandestine Videos of Ecuador Judge in Chevron Case
Frank Bajak and Jeanneth Valdivieso
The Associated Press
October 29, 2009

One of two men who made clandestine video recordings allegedly showing government bias and kickback-soliciting in a $27 billion oil contamination lawsuit is a convicted felon with a history of legal troubles, The Associated Press has learned.

An AP investigation also has found no evidence that Wayne Douglas Hansen worked in his professed field of environmental remediation.

Court records show that Hansen, 62, pleaded guilty to charges of facilitating the importation of marijuana in a 1987 case in Brownsville, Texas. A co-defendant said that Hansen was in charge of buying a DC-7 that prosecutors alleged would be used to fly 275,000 pounds (124,740 kilos) of marijuana to the United States from Colombia.

Hansen, a U.S. citizen who served 19 months in federal prison in that case, also lost civil lawsuits charging him with unleashing two pitbulls on a neighbor and her golden retriever, and with tearing up the walls of another person's house with a jackhammer, according to California county court records and the plaintiffs.


Read more: http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202435029781&rss...

[Peace Patriot]

1. Rumsfeld's "Office of Special Plans-in-exile" strikes again?

First the "miracle laptop" (later, laptopS), trying to smear Chavez and Correa. Now this--more high tech "doctored" crapola, trying to smear the judge in a case that Chevron knew it was going to lose. Oh, and we mustn't forget the "suitcase full of money" caper out of Miami, trying to smear Chavez and Cristina Fernandez.

I'm sure South American fascists (and Chevron) have their own black ops capabilities, but these smell so much like the shit Rumsfeld was up to, that you gotta wonder...well...what he's up to--especially given his interest, all of sudden, upon being ousted from the Pentagon, in South American countries with lots of oil (i.e., his op-ed in the Washington Post of 12/1/07, "The Smart Way to Defeat Tyrants like Chavez").

And it sure is interesting that a U.S. felon is involved in this one. (Not that I object to the MJ trade especially, but pitbulls and jackhammering somebody's house? Drug prosecution is how they get people in prison they can use--people ripened for violent or clandestine activities. And you gotta wonder, too, about all these death squadders that Colombia has been extraditing to the U.S. for drug prosecution. What might they be used for?)

The 30,000 people who are sick from Texaco's pollution had a slamdunk case against Chevron--led by a self-educated, indigenous attorney all by himself, against arrays of way overpaid corporate attorneys with full staffs and lots of money to purchase "experts." It was a classic case of corporate "musical chairs"--the corp in trouble from its own horrendous neglect and criminality gets "bought out" by the bigger shark, trying to erase all liabilities. (We just saw this here with Diebold being "bought out" by ES&S election systems--like two peas in a pod, as to their origins and their deep far rightwing connections.) Texaco's supposed clean-up was a total sham. I've seen the pictures--with highly toxic waste seeping out of the mud that they used to try to cover it up. It has been called the "Rainforest Chernoybl," it is so bad--with polluted, destroyed fisheries and toxic water all the way to Peru.

Is it any wonder that we are seeing psyops against pro-people leaders like Correa and against judges who are not impressed with lying, scumbag, corporate shill attorneys. They did this to the judge because he couldn't be bought. That is the truth of the matter. This is what corpo-fascists do, when leaders won't knuckle under--they manufacture the opposite of the truth. Look at what they did to John Kerry! He did his military service and won medals for valor, while Junior was on a bender from the Texas National Guard. But who ends up smeared as somehow a cowardly derelict? This "Big Lie" technique has fully transferred from Stalinist Russia to Corporate U.S.A., and, when people don't believe them, they do black ops like this to make their goddamn lies seem plausible.

I pray for the day that we see Chevron pay up for this horror. I hope the second judge holds to the truth.

[Judi Lynn]

2. Felon involved in clandestine videos in Ecuador

Felon involved in clandestine videos in Ecuador
By FRANK BAJAK and JEANNETH VALDIVIESO
The Associated Press
Thursday, October 29, 2009; 4:18 PM



This late 1960's photo released by
the The National Personnel Records
Center in St. Louis shows Wayne
Hansen at the time of his induction
into the U.S. Army. (AP Photo/
National Personnel Records Center)

This late 1960's photo released by QUITO, Ecuador -- A man who made clandestine video recordings used to discredit Ecuador in a $27 billion oil contamination lawsuit is a convicted felon with a history of legal troubles, The Associated Press has learned.

An AP investigation also has found no evidence that Wayne Douglas Hansen ever worked in his professed field of environmental remediation.

Hansen was one of two men who used spy cameras in a watch and a pen to videotape a judge in the lawsuit against Chevron Corp. Chevron released the images in August, saying they prove it can't get a fair trial in Ecuador and that the lawsuit over contamination in the Amazon rain forest should be dismissed.

~snip~
In the videotapes, taken in May and June, Hansen is introduced as an American groundwater remediation executive with extensive international experience. In one of them, Borja says Hansen's company has "an exclusive franchise for Honeywell for water treatment plants." Honeywell International Inc. spokesman Jake Saylor called that untrue.

Hansen, in two brief interviews, told AP he had water-treatment projects in Mexico and Ecuador. But when a reporter questioned those claims, he hung up.

Chevron flew Borja and his wife to the United States in late June for their protection and committed to finding them "suitable employment," according to documents released by Chevron this week. But Chevron spokesman Kent Robertson said that the company "is not associated" with Hansen and has given him no money, though it has offered to pay for security and legal fees relating to the videotapes.

~snip~
The plaintiffs, who say they represent about 30,000 inhabitants of the Ecuadorean Amazon, claim a consortium operated by Texaco from 1972-1990 contaminated much of a Rhode Island-sized oil patch, causing elevated cancer rates. They are seeking damages for cleanup and to compensate for illnesses.

Chevron, based in San Ramon, California, bought Texaco in 2001. It says a 1998 agreement Texaco signed with Ecuador's government following a $40 million cleanup frees Chevron of liability. It calls the cancer claims unfounded.

Chevron says Ecuador should be investigating the alleged extortion scheme captured in the videotapes.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...

[Judi Lynn]

3. Chevron Employs Felon and Drug-Trafficker to Derail Trial to Escape Enviro Crimes

Chevron Employs Felon and Drug-Trafficker to Derail Trial to Escape Enviro Crimes

By Han Shan, AlterNet. Posted October 30, 2009.

It appears that American oil giant Chevron is employing methods -- and people -- that are as dirty as the toxic waste pits it left scattered across the rainforest floor
To defend itself in a major environmental lawsuit in Ecuador, it appears that American oil giant Chevron is employing methods -- and people -- that are as dirty as the toxic waste pits it left scattered across the rainforest floor.

In early September, I wrote here about a dramatic last-ditch attempt by Chevron to monkey-wrench legal proceedings in Ecuador over massive oil contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Chevron is facing up to $27 billion dollars in damages to clean up what has become known as the 'Amazon Chernobyl,' where tens of thousands of indigenous people and campesinos suffer an epidemic of cancer, miscarriages, birth defects, and other ailments.

On August 31, just weeks before a final judgment had been expected in the case, Chevron posted on YouTube what at first appeared to be a 'smoking gun' spy video, which Chevron said showed the judge in the case ensnared in a bribery scandal.

Except, as I wrote before, it didn't:

The company instead revealed videos showing a former Chevron contractor named Diego Borja and an American businessman named Wayne Hansen, who appear to be trying fruitlessly to entrap the presiding Judge, Juan Nuñez. Borja and Hansen secretly shot the videos themselves using a spy-camera pen and watch they bought in a catalog. In the videos, Borja introduced Mr. Hansen as an executive of an American groundwater remediation company willing to provide a kickback for a government contract to clean up the oil contamination left behind by Texaco, now Chevron. The California-based oil giant claimed the videos showed obvious government bias, corruption and judicial misconduct and called for an annulment of the judge's rulings in the case.

But almost immediately, the entire supposed "corruption scandal" began unraveling.As The New York Times wrote:

The two mysterious businessmen, who used watches and pens implanted with bugging devices to make the recordings, have refused to explain their motivations for going to the furtive meetings in Quito and a jungle outpost to discuss a bribery plot. And now, with questions mounting, one of them has enlisted a lawyer who has represented Barry Bonds.

The article doesn't mention that Chevron agreed to pay for both Borja and Hansen's criminal defense lawyers, though it does explain that the company had paid Borja, its former contractor, "an undisclosed amount for moving and living expenses so he could safely move his family out of Ecuador."

And now for the latest bombshell. "American businessman" and "remediation expert" Wayne Hansen is neither. Rather, he is a convicted felon and drug trafficker, with a "litany of legal troubles," according to the Associated Press.

More:
http://www.alternet.org/action/143628/chevron_employs_f...