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eprise their criminal scheme again and again: "take legal fees we can earn from this case and do
more cases like this in different places. With, you know, the same team, if possible."
1. Pressuring the Lago Agrio Court and Manufacturing Evidence
a. Implementing Pressure Tactics and Colluding With
Ecuadorian Government Officials
72. Central to the RICO Defendants' and their co-conspirators' scheme to defraud
and extOli Chevron is the fact that Ecuador's judiciary has developed systemic weakness and
corruption, in addition to other significant flaws and shortcomings. The conspirators are aware
ofthis fact, and have sought to exploit it. According to Donziger, "[T]he court is now in play, up
for grabs, and accessible." Donziger has boasted that, unlike in the United States, the "game" is
"dirty" and there are "almost no rules" in Ecuador. Donziger and his co-conspirators have
sought repeatedly to capitalize on the Ecuadorian judiciary's weakness, threatening violence,
bullying judges, and using political connections to obtain rulings in their favor based on the
judges' fear of repercussions rather than the facts or law. Indeed, Donziger instructed one of his
co-conspirators to "prepare a detailed plan with the necessary steps to attack the judge through
legal, institutional channels and through any other channel you can think of." Attacking the
judge was necessary, because, as Donziger put it: "[T]he only way the court will respect us is if
they fear us-and ... the only way they will fear us is ifthey think we have [s]ome control over
their careers, their jobs, their reputations-that is to say, their ability to earn a livelihood." This
fear and "constant pressure on the judge and the court" is essential to the RICO Defendants' and
their co-conspirators' plan to obtain "a fast decision." With assistance from the highest levels of
the Ecuadorian government, the RICO Defendants and their co-conspirators ensured that the
Lago Agrio court would rule against Chevron, as it ultimately did.
73. The RICO Defendants and their co-conspirators do not view the enterprise in
which they are engaged as a lawsuit. As Donziger has explained, the litigation "is not a legal
case," but a "political battle that's being played out through a legal case." In other words,
Donziger and his co-conspirators knew that what "we need to do is to get the politics in order ...
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