The banana company Chiquita Manufacturers Worldwide has been deemed accountable for supporting a right-wing paramilitary group in Colombia and is required to compensate the family of eight people who had been murdered by the group through the nation’s civil battle. This choice by a federal courtroom in Florida on Monday is a historic verdict, following 17 years of authorized battles. It’s the first occasion by which a significant company has been held accountable for related claims in opposition to these harmed by the United Self-Protection Forces of Colombia (AUC), in response to the legal professionals representing the victims.
In 2007, Chiquita admitted to at least one cost of conducting enterprise dealings with a “particularly designated worldwide terrorist” and was mandated to pay a $25 million penalty by the U.S. Division of Justice on the time. The corporate was alleged to have made illegal funds to the AUC, a paramilitary group notorious for its involvement in large-scale killings, abductions of civilians, and the disfigurement of their our bodies. The lawsuit, initially introduced by the non-profit EarthRights Worldwide in 2007, led to a number of further lawsuits in 2008, the group reported. A gaggle of regulation corporations from throughout the US have been representing greater than 5,000 victims from Colombia within the case, with extra trials deliberate for different victims in July, in response to the legal professionals. The choice reached on Monday, after a six-week trial and two days of discussions, additionally signifies the primary occasion the place a significant U.S. firm has been held accountable for its participation in human rights violations abroad, in response to the legal professionals. This verdict may affect related authorized actions involving such violations.
The eight people submitting the lawsuit, which additionally contains the family of eight males killed by the AUC, claimed that Chiquita paid near $2 million to the aggressive militant group. The agency additional accused the group of “serving to transport weapons, explosives, and narcotics, although it was conscious that the AUC was a felony group concerned in a interval of terror,” in response to a press release from Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll.
The legal professionals representing the plaintiffs claimed that Chiquita’s backing of the AUC broke each U.S. and Colombian authorized codes. All through the courtroom proceedings, they contended that the company deliberately collaborated with the AUC to safeguard its earnings and to quell employee dissatisfaction. On Monday, a federal panel in Florida decided that Chiquita deliberately equipped important assist to the insurgent group by monetary contributions or different types of assist, to a stage that fairly foresaw potential hazard. The eight people had been murdered by the AUC, and Chiquita didn’t reveal that its backing of the group was motivated by an instantaneous menace to the corporate or its staff, in response to the jury.
“The decision doesn’t deliver again the husbands and sons who had been killed, nevertheless it units the file straight and locations accountability for funding terrorism the place it belongs: at Chiquita’s doorstep,” Agnieszka Fryszman, a lawyer at regulation agency Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, mentioned in a press release.
Because the legal professionals representing the plaintiffs rejoiced over the choice on Monday, they identified that the broader authorized battle in opposition to Chiquita includes 1000’s extra claimants — whose “issues might be settled by extra courtroom proceedings, or a ultimate settlement.”