By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BOGOTA, Colombia – Former drug lord, Daniel Rendon Herrera, or “Don Mario,” was convicted Monday and sentenced to 17 years in prison for the murder of an attorney. Don Mario was convicted for aggravated homicide, kidnapping and conspiracy.

According to a judge in the central Colombian city of Villavicencio, “Don Mario” ordered the kidnapping and murder of attorney Jose Absalom Achury Florez. This occurred while Mario was the paramilitary leader of the drug gang “Los Urabeños.”

The attorney was kidnapped by paramilitary officers from the town of Granada, Meta, in May of 2003. He was found dead 11 days later in his car 10 miles from where he was kidnapped.

Late last month, Colombian officers dismantled Mario’s drug operation, capturing seven of its members in two northwestern provinces. Alleged gang leader Luis Eduardo Vargas, alias “Pipon,” who is accused of committing hundreds of crimes in the region and of smuggling drugs to the United States via Central America is one of the members said to be detained.

Mario has been in custody since April, 2009 and the Colombian Supreme Court in March denied a request for his extradition from the United States, which accused him of providing material support to a terrorist organization and of conspiring to import, manufacture, possess and distribute cocaine in the United States. More than 3,000 homicides and other crimes, including forced displacement and disappearance, have been attributed to the Mario’s gang.

For more information, please see:

Colombia Reports – “Don Mario” Sentenced to 17 Years in Jail – 18 January 2011

Colombia Reports- Authorities Dismantle “Don Mario’s” Gang – 31 December 2010

Latin American Herald Tribune – Colombia Busts Gang Linked to Notorious Drug Lord – 31 December 2010

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

TERESOPOLIS, Brazil—More than 600 people are thought to be dead after severe floods and dangerous mudslides that occurred on January 13 in Brazil. Today, numerous survivors are struggling to endure without much-needed help from their government. At least 14,000 people are believed to be homeless after what is already being called the country’s worst natural disaster.

Rain continues to fall on affected areas, making bad conditions even worse. According to the Associated Press, about 225 federal police officers are working to enforce order and fire departments have reported deploying 2,500 rescue workers. But the poor weather conditions have blocked roads and many areas are unreachable, leaving injured or isolated citizens without aid.

In some areas, the police officers do little more than stand and watch as survivors haul supplies to other neighborhoods in need. Sgt. Luciano Comin, dressed in a neat, clean uniform, said, “Our function here today is to avoid looting.”

Survivors like Wanderson Ferreira de Carvalho are trying everything in their power to stay alive and help others in need. He told the Associated Press that 23 of his family members had perished in the disasters, including his wife and 2-year-old son. Still in a state of shock, he worried about friends and neighbors who remain isolated because of flooded roads.

Carvalho, like other survivors, has been exhausting himself carrying supplies (food, water, blankets) long distances over flooded paths in hopes of saving other victims. “We have to help those who are alive,” he stressed. “There is no more help for those who are dead. I’ve cried a lot and sometimes my mind goes blank and I almost forget what happened. But we have to do what we must to help the living.”

Many residents have expressed doubt that the government will ever attempt to render any aid; they have depended instead on their own willpower and the kindess of friends and relatives. “It has been four days [since the disasters struck],” one survivor said. “The president has flown over, I saw on TV. Is it taking them this long to get organized?” Another citizen, who carried supplies for herself, her mother and infant daughter, accused, “Where is the government? What are they doing? This is shameful.”

President Dilma Rousseff has assigned $60 million in aid but only half of that amount will arrive in local accounts by Monday, six days after the disasters.

The mudslides struck a mountainous area 900 square miles in size, 40 miles north of Rio.

For more information, please see:

NY Times-Rain Hampers Search After Brazilian Mudslides-16 January 2011

AP-Brazil slide survivors left to fend on own-16 January 2011

Examiner-Stories of horror as flood survivors in Brazil without government aid-15 January, 2011

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

QUITO, Ecuador—Locked in a lawsuit over their allegedly environmentally unsound oil practices, Chevron Corp. has now turned up the heat against their legal opponents.  Chevron has subpoenaed and published numerous documents privately exchanged between members of the plaintiffs’ legal team.  The documents include emails and letters, and even a diary.  Also released are cut scenes from a documentary about the case.

Outtakes being used from the documentary “Crude” include a scene of plaintiffs’ attorney Steven Donziger saying that Ecuadoran judges respond better to fear than the law.  Donziger goes on to say that any judge ruling against the plaintiffs might not be killed by angry Ecuadorans, but “[the judge will think] he will be [killed] . . . which is just as good.”

Although Chevron thinks that their line of documents and film scenes add up to fraud and misconduct by the plaintiffs’ legal team, the team’s spokesperson explained:  “The comments were all born out of a frustration with Chevron’s efforts to undermine the trial in Ecuador.  The real fraud in this case is Chevron’s intentional contamination of the rain forest and its efforts, now on display in the United States, to cover it up.”

In 2003, a class action lawsuit was brought against Texaco, which was acquired by Chevron in 2001.  The lawsuit was brought in Ecuador by claimants alleging that the company contaminated the land where it was performing oil operations.  The claimants believed that the environmental pollution increased cancer rates and other medical issues in those who lived in the area.  After judicial inspections of the region, an independent expert in 2008 recommended that the court demand Chevron pay $27 billion as compensation for their activities.

The initial judge in the case recused himself after allegations were made about judicial misconduct; the current judge has intimated that a verdict may be expected sometime this year.

This present chapter in the lawsuit is preceded by a history dating back to a similar lawsuit filed against Texaco in 1993.  Texaco drilled for oil in an Ecuadoran rain forest from 1964 until 1992, unloading a petroleum and water mix into pits near the oil wells.

For more information, please see:

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre-Case profile: Texaco/Chevron lawsuits (re Ecuador)-12 January 2011

Westlaw News & Insight-Film outtakes steal stage in Chevron Ecuador case-11 January 2011

San Francisco Chronicle-Chevron tries to use foe’s words against them-29 December 2010