Steven Donziger is the American human rights lawyer at the center of the Chevron case, a decades-long legal fight that began with oil contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon and ended with Donziger disbarred, jailed for criminal contempt, and condemned by the United Nations as arbitrarily detained. He won a $9.5 billion pollution judgment against Chevron in Ecuador in 2011. A U.S. federal judge then found in 2014 that the judgment had been procured through bribery and fraud, and a later contempt prosecution, brought by private lawyers appointed by that same judge after federal prosecutors refused the case, kept Donziger under house arrest and in prison for 993 days on a misdemeanor carrying a 180-day maximum.1Amnesty International. Biden Should Pardon Steven Donziger Before Leaving Office
The Amazon Contamination and the Ecuadorian Judgment
Donziger, a 1991 Harvard Law graduate and former D.C. public defender, first visited the Ecuadorian Amazon in 1993.2Harry Walker Agency. Steven Donziger That year, he and other attorneys filed Aguinda v. Texaco in New York federal court on behalf of more than 30,000 Ecuadorian residents.3Harvard Law School. Steven Donziger ’91 at the Center of Big Legal Battle
The claims stemmed from a consortium led by Texaco that drilled 339 wells in Ecuador’s Oriente region between 1964 and 1992. Over that period, roughly 19.3 billion gallons of toxic produced water were dumped into the environment and more than 19 million gallons of crude oil spilled from the Trans-Ecuadorian pipeline. Drilling waste sat in unlined open pits, and crude was sprayed on unpaved roads for dust control.4Stanford Law School. Environmental Contamination and the Lago Agrio Litigation Affected communities came to call the area the “Amazon Chernobyl.”5Harvard Politics. Free Steven Donziger
The U.S. case was dismissed in 2002 on forum non conveniens grounds after Texaco agreed to submit to Ecuadorian jurisdiction. Chevron had acquired Texaco in 2001. The plaintiffs refiled in Lago Agrio, Ecuador, in 2003.4Stanford Law School. Environmental Contamination and the Lago Agrio Litigation In 2011 an Ecuadorian court found Chevron liable and issued a judgment of more than $18 billion. Appeals eliminated the punitive component, and Ecuador’s highest court eventually affirmed a compensatory award of roughly $9.5 billion, the largest environmental judgment in history at the time.5Harvard Politics. Free Steven Donziger
Chevron did not pay. Enforcement efforts by the plaintiffs in Canada, Argentina, and Brazil all failed.6Chevron. Ecuador Litigation Timeline
Chevron’s RICO Case and the Fraud Findings
In 2011, Chevron filed a civil racketeering suit against Donziger and the plaintiffs’ team in the Southern District of New York. The case landed before Judge Lewis A. Kaplan.
In March 2014, Kaplan issued a 500-page ruling concluding the Ecuadorian judgment had been obtained by corrupt means. Among his findings: Donziger and his team secretly paid the court-appointed damages expert, Richard Cabrera, to ghostwrite his report; bribed the presiding Ecuadorian judge, Nicolás Zambrano, to let the plaintiffs’ lawyers draft the final judgment; and coerced another judge by threatening a sexual harassment complaint. The court identified RICO predicate acts including extortion, wire fraud, money laundering, and obstruction of justice.7Harvard Law Review. Chevron Corp. v. Donziger
Much of the evidence came from more than 600 hours of raw footage shot for the 2009 documentary Crude. Chevron obtained the outtakes after Kaplan ruled the filmmaker lacked journalistic privilege because the film had been solicited by the plaintiffs’ lawyers.8Courthouse News Service. Director Loses Appeal Over Crude Outtakes The footage captured Donziger describing his approach toward the Ecuadorian judge as one of “pressure, intimidation, and humiliation.”9Stanford Law School. Donziger and the Lago Agrio Litigation
Kaplan issued a nationwide injunction barring Donziger and the Ecuadorian plaintiffs from enforcing the judgment in the United States and imposed a constructive trust on any assets recovered elsewhere.10NYU Journal of International Law and Politics. Chevron Corp. v. Donziger, 974 F. Supp. 2d 362 The Second Circuit unanimously affirmed in August 2016, holding that RICO authorizes equitable relief for private parties and that the Ecuadorian appellate courts’ confirmation of the judgment did not sever the causal chain from the underlying fraud.7Harvard Law Review. Chevron Corp. v. Donziger
The Star Witness Problem
Central to Chevron’s fraud case was Alberto Guerra Bastidas, a former Ecuadorian judge who testified that Zambrano rubber-stamped a ruling drafted by the plaintiffs. Guerra’s credibility was contested throughout. He admitted accepting or giving between 20 and 40 bribes over his career, sometimes for as little as $200.11Courthouse News Service. Damning Testimony in Chevron Case Attacked
Chevron’s arrangements with Guerra were extensive: $10,000 per month in salary, a $2,000 monthly housing allowance, a car, health insurance, relocation for his family, and additional payments for documents and devices labeled “evidence.”11Courthouse News Service. Damning Testimony in Chevron Case Attacked Kaplan himself called Guerra a witness of “seriously doubtful credibility.”12U.S. Supreme Court. Donziger Petition Filing
Guerra later told an international arbitration tribunal that large parts of his sworn RICO testimony had been “exaggerated and, in other cases, simply not true,” and that there was “no evidence to corroborate allegations of a bribe or a ghostwritten judgment.”13Business & Human Rights Resource Centre. Chevron’s Star Witness Admits to Lying Kaplan said in a 2018 order that his ruling would have been the same without Guerra’s testimony.
The Contempt Prosecution and House Arrest
The criminal case grew out of Donziger’s refusal to comply with post-judgment orders. Kaplan had ordered him to surrender his electronic devices for forensic imaging, hand over his passport, and pay court-ordered attorney’s fees to Chevron. Donziger refused, arguing that turning over his devices would breach attorney-client privilege and endanger clients in Ecuador.14Amnesty International. Urgent Action on Steven Donziger
Kaplan referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. Federal prosecutors declined the case. Kaplan then drafted six counts of criminal contempt himself and, under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 42, appointed attorneys from the law firm Seward & Kissel as special prosecutors.15NYU Law Review. Donziger v. United States The firm had represented Chevron as recently as 2018.16Courthouse News Service. Lawyer in Ecuador Oil Case Ends Contempt Trial Without Mounting Defense Kaplan also bypassed the random assignment process and personally selected Judge Loretta Preska to preside.
Donziger was placed under house arrest with an ankle monitor at his Manhattan apartment for more than two years while awaiting trial. On October 1, 2021, after a bench trial before Judge Preska, he was convicted on all six counts and sentenced to six months in prison. Preska cited “a pattern of contumacious behavior” and said “it seems only the proverbial 2-by-4 between the eyes will instill in him any respect of law.”17Courthouse News Service. Disbarred Environmental Lawyer Sentenced to Prison for Criminal Contempt
Donziger reported to prison on October 27, 2021, was released in early December to finish his sentence at home, and completed the sentence on April 25, 2022.18Amnesty International. Steven Donziger’s Release Counting pretrial house arrest, he was deprived of his liberty for 993 days on a misdemeanor carrying a 180-day statutory maximum.1Amnesty International. Biden Should Pardon Steven Donziger Before Leaving Office
Appeals and Gorsuch’s Dissent
Donziger’s principal appellate argument was that the appointment of private prosecutors after the Justice Department declined the case violated the Constitution’s Appointments Clause. On June 22, 2022, the Second Circuit upheld the conviction. Judges Michael Park and William Nardini held that Rule 42 special prosecutors are “officers under the appointments clause” but that the district court did not commit plain error in appointing them under existing Supreme Court precedent. Judge Steven Menashi dissented, writing that the executive branch has “exclusive and absolute authority” over whether to prosecute and that Congress had not authorized courts to appoint their own prosecutors this way.19Bloomberg Law. Donziger’s Contempt Conviction in Chevron Fraud Case Upheld
The Supreme Court denied certiorari on March 27, 2023. Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, dissented from the denial. Gorsuch argued the arrangement placed the district court in “the dual position as accuser and decisionmaker” and wrote: “In this country, judges have no more power to initiate a prosecution of those who come before them than prosecutors have to sit in judgment of those they charge.” He identified “considerable tension” between court-appointed prosecutors and recent separation-of-powers rulings including Lucia v. SEC, Seila Law v. CFPB, and United States v. Arthrex.20U.S. Supreme Court. Donziger v. United States, No. 22-274
Disbarment in New York and D.C.
On August 13, 2020, the New York Appellate Division, First Department, disbarred Donziger, finding him guilty of “egregious professional misconduct” based on Kaplan’s fraud findings. A court-appointed referee, John Horan, had recommended that Donziger be allowed to keep practicing; the appellate court rejected that recommendation.21Courthouse News Service. Steven Donziger, Who Battled Chevron in Ecuador, Has Been Disbarred In July 2022, the D.C. Court of Appeals ordered reciprocal disbarment, rejecting Donziger’s arguments that the New York proceedings involved due process violations.22D.C. Courts. In Re Donziger, 18-BG-967
International Reaction and the Pardon Campaign
In September 2021, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention concluded that Donziger’s detention lacked a legal basis, violated fair trial standards, and appeared to be “in retaliation for his work as a lawyer for the Indigenous communities in Ecuador.” The group recommended his immediate release.14Amnesty International. Urgent Action on Steven Donziger Amnesty International adopted the case, and 29 Nobel laureates described the prosecution as “judicial harassment.”23Georgetown Law. Human Rights Lawyer Who Took on Chevron Put Under House Arrest
Representative Jim McGovern and other lawmakers first asked President Biden for a pardon in April 2022.24Rep. Jim McGovern. Congressional Letter Requesting Donziger Pardon In December 2024, 34 members of Congress, including Senators Bernie Sanders and Sheldon Whitehouse and Representatives Jamie Raskin and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, sent a second letter requesting a “full and unconditional pardon.”25E&E News. Dems Prod Biden to Pardon Enviro Attorney No pardon was granted before Biden left office.
Where Things Stand
Donziger is disbarred in both New York and Washington, D.C., and cannot practice law. The Southern District of New York still holds his passport, keeping him inside the United States.26IISD. Chevron Collects Over USD 200 Million in Decade-Old Arbitration
In November 2025, an UNCITRAL tribunal in the long-running Chevron v. Ecuador investment arbitration awarded Chevron only 15 percent of the $323 million the company sought for legal costs tied to the RICO litigation. The tribunal called the RICO case a “facially reasonable mitigation strategy” but acknowledged the possibility that Chevron’s motives also included efforts to “distract and/or bankrupt the judgment creditors,” “deter other plaintiffs,” or “act on a sense of vengeance” against Donziger personally.26IISD. Chevron Collects Over USD 200 Million in Decade-Old Arbitration The $9.5 billion Ecuadorian judgment remains unpaid, and the contamination claims that started the case remain unresolved for the affected communities.