In “U.S. Jury Holds Chiquita Liable for Colombian Death Squad’s Murder of Banana Workers,” Common Dreams reports that: “In what case litigants are calling the first time an American jury has held a U.S. corporation legally liable for atrocities abroad, federal jurors in Florida on Monday found that Chiquita Brands International financed a Colombian paramilitary death squad that murdered, tortured, and terrorized workers in a bid to crush labor unrest in the 1990s and 2000s.

“The federal jury in West Palm Beach, Florida found the banana giant responsible for funding the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) and awarded eight families whose members were murdered by the right-wing paramilitary group $38.3 million in damages.

“EarthRights International, which first filed the case — Doe v. Chiquita — in 2007, called the verdict ‘a milestone for justice.'”

TERRY KARL, tkarl@stanford.edu
Karl — who is currently in Colombia and available for a limited number of interviews — filed an expert report in the Chiquita case. She is a Stanford University professor of political science emeritus and former director of their Center for Latin American Studies. She said today: “This groundbreaking verdict not only gives a measure of justice to those who lost their loved ones but also lays the basis for more victims to seek justice.”