Banana giant Chiquita held liable by US court for funding paramilitaries

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c6pprpd3x96o

by no_exit • 2 years ago

579 287 2 years ago

It's about time one of these Chiquita (ex United Fruit Company, Cuyamel Fruit Company, and others) / Dole (ex Standard Fruit Company) are held liable.

[1] https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/food-drink/story-bananas-ban...

[2] https://growjungles.com/united-fruit-company-in-costa-rica/

[3] https://www.biggerlifeadventures.com/chiquita-bananas-cia-fu...

[4] https://history.wsu.edu/rci/sample-research-project/

Edit: formatting

Xelbair• 2 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A...

I'll add this to the list

riehwvfbk• 2 years ago

If you're going to add to the list, the annexation of Hawaii by Dole certainly belongs there.

nathancahill• 2 years ago

Always relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cCLJieV9IY

tomcam2• 2 years ago

Offhand, I agree with the judgment. But I am also gratified that the term "Banana giant" led off a Hacker News title. Surprisingly it wasn't on my 2024 HN bingo card.

iwontberude• 2 years ago

"Giant banana" almost hit, I won't lose hope now.

tomcam2• 2 years ago

We’ve all got to pull together on this one

sofixa• 2 years ago

I'm curious about why nobody from Chiquita went to prison for financing a terrorist group.

Random Afghans and Iraqis were kidnapped for Guantanamo or outright murdered for less.

hulitu2• 2 years ago

I'm curious about why nobody from Chiquita went to prison for financing a terrorist group.

That's not how democracy works. /s

Companies do not have to obey the law and, when they are caught, nobody goes to jail. They just need to pay some protection money.

Want to be a criminal without fear of prosecution ? Join a company, preferably on a management position.

lazide3• 2 years ago

Because they were working in the vein of manifest destiny/US gov’t interests.

The CIA helped them, by overthrowing at least one gov’t. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%2527%...]

Money has always been a national interest for every gov’t everywhere.

jjk166• 2 years ago

This was a civil case, seeking damages for actions that occurred over 2 decades ago, it's unlikely anyone currently with the company was sufficiently high ranking then to be considered personally responsible.

For the 2007 criminal case, the company came to the department of justice and disclosed the payments, saying they had been made under threat of violence. Specifically the AUC was threatening physical harm to employees of a Chiquita subsidiary in Columbia. The department of justice appears to have accepted that the payments were made under duress, but did not recognize that as a sufficient excuse, and decided to prosecute anyways. The company reached a plea agreement.

Honestly, it seems like the justice department came down pretty hard. Obviously giving money to terrorist groups under any circumstances shortly after 9/11 would be highly scrutinized, and the company could have dropped the columbian subsidiary, which they wound up doing eventually anyways, instead of continuing to pay the protection racket. But still it seems like they were victims in this too.

pyuser583• 2 years ago

This is really important context. As is the relatively small amount of money paid.

It’s also strongly analogous to an issue faced in tech: whether to pay the demands or ransomware gangs.

If the ransomeware gang has ties to terrorism, it’s a crime to pay the ransom.

selimthegrim2• 2 years ago

I vaguely remember Coca-Cola being accused of doing the same thing with their bottling plants there but not sure what came of it legally

JumpCrisscross13• 2 years ago

curious about why nobody from Chiquita went to prison for financing a terrorist group

It looks like the people who could be held individually criminally liable were in Colombia [1]. (I also imagine Chiquita gets points for notifying the DoJ versus getting caught.)

Random Afghans and Iraqis were kidnapped for Guantanamo or outright murdered for less

To be fair, there is a world of difference between financing a foreign terrorist group and financing one that is attacking Americans. (That and we're cavalier with the lives of South Americans.)

[1] https://www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2007/March/07_nsd_161...

adhamsalama2• 2 years ago

And why were those Iraqis attacking American soldiers? Perhaps because the US invaded Iraq?

soperj2• 2 years ago

Just to be clear, neither Afghanistan, nor Iraq were responsible for 9/11.

zardo• 2 years ago

An anti-communist paramilitary in Columbia? They aren't exactly going to top the US most wanted list.

frontalier2• 2 years ago

you might find the answer to this when looking out the window of the train as you head to the yearly jazz festival by the lake

riddley• 2 years ago

I think we can all be happy with the fine that's less than a hundredth of a percent of their annual income that they'll have to pay. Justice is served.

mediumsmart• 2 years ago

War is a racket and governments are the shadows of corporations.

we, the people, are liable

rgovostes• 2 years ago

See also the Banana Massacre instigated by the United Fruit Company against plantation workers making outrageous demands like limiting the work week to 6 days. 100 years later, that company operates under the name Chiquita.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Massacre

greenhearth• 2 years ago

Documented in the famous Neruda poem

dpig_• 2 years ago

And alluded to by Marquez.

sitkack2• 2 years ago

When I was in Nepal, they were getting USD to "fight the communists" and when I read their manifesto, it was all about removing corruption from the system. Nothing "communist" about it.

Same as this shit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Massacre#Strike

rflrob• 2 years ago

Also the Guatemalan coup that was heavily lobbied for by the United Fruit Company.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%2527%...

slantedview• 2 years ago

"The United Fruit Company (UFC), whose highly profitable business had been affected by the softening of exploitative labor practices in Guatemala, engaged in an influential lobbying campaign to persuade the U.S. to overthrow the Guatemalan government."

It's amazing how decades later, they heirs of United Fruit Company are still using violence as a tool for increasing profit. This is what happens when individuals are not criminally prosecuted for bad conduct. I'm sure it will happen again.

debo_2• 2 years ago

The banana republic jokes just write themselves!

frontalier2• 2 years ago

check out where they're headquartered

stonogo• 2 years ago

Does it count as a joke when the term was originated to describe governments who enabled this exact behavior from this exact company?

lbsnake7• 2 years ago

Great documentary that Frontline made about something similar called Firestone and the Warlord. Firestone paid warlord Charles Taylor money to ‘protect’ their rubber plantations (essentially extortion), this money ended up providing him almost all of his funding during the Liberian civil war and made him a major player. He is now in prison for war crimes for what he did during this period.

njovin• 2 years ago

They have been fined $38m for killing 8 people, which amounts to a tad over 1% of their 2023 revenue.

I'm very happy that an example is being made of them to warn other corporations that committing murder to protect your profits may cause a slight dip in your next earnings report.

evulhotdog2• 2 years ago

Of course it’s not nearly as much as it should be, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.

anigbrowl2• 2 years ago

Incrementalism normalizes dystopia, in my view; this becomes just another contingency that can be budgeted for.

Imagine, by contrast, the impact that executing one Chiquita executive would have.

chmod775• 2 years ago

They have been fined $38m

This is damages, not a fine.

for killing 8 people

If this verdict stands, you can bet there will be more lawsuits coming.

which amounts to a tad over 1% of their 2023 revenue

There's income statements available for some years. Their margins are tiny - usually profits are 10% of their revenue or less. Sometimes much less or none.

msarrel• 2 years ago

Better call out the Marines to enforce the US interests in bananas.

sitkack2• 2 years ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dtv_LjleEgM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler

Gualdrapo• 2 years ago

Allegedly also Coca-Cola, Drummond and even some local companies like Postobón have been involved with paramilitary groups and sponsored crimes against civilians - and haven't faced any consequences. But this is a good precedent.

digging2• 2 years ago

Certain there are others. Naomi Klein wrote about Ford paying to have its own Argentine employees murdered during the junta in the 70s, apparently to prevent unionization.

stavros2• 2 years ago

What the hell kind of corporate exec goes "well, I guess I have to get them murdered, there's shareholder value to protect"?

fuzztester3• 2 years ago

Also this, right in the USA:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Overpass

Mentioned here too:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ford

danlugo922• 2 years ago

Everyone pays protection money in Colombia, every single commercial entity except in the most upscale places.

xvector7• 2 years ago

It's incredibly unjust that companies are punished for paying "protection money" (read: "pay us or we burn your property and employees to the ground.")

password_• 2 years ago

The US government would never do such a thing.

krapp2• 2 years ago

Wait until you find out how Hawaii became a state.

tracker1• 2 years ago

Or Florida.

banku_brougham• 2 years ago

Ive been learning about colonialsm and this shows up on HN

edit: I just learned about Ken Saro-Wiwa

buildsjets2• 2 years ago

My family home is built on the former estate of Minor Cooper Keith, a founder and former VP of United Fruit, who did many similar horrible things to people in Central and South America. I learned this while researching the name of the waterway behind our house, called "Keith Canal". You can see the history of the development in historic maps from 1829 thru 1976.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Cooper_Keith

https://westisliphistoricalsociety.org/index.php/archives/ma...

mistrial9• 2 years ago

none of that Wikipedia article reflect the comments here.. maybe take a minute to organize some references and edit? a new section on "controversy" might fit

buildsjets2• 2 years ago

Editing Wikipedia is way too much of a pain in the butt. What will and will not they accept as a primary source? What if even the United Fruit Company website provides a citation that 4000 enslaved people died under his supervision at the age of 23 while overseeing construction of just 25 miles of his railroad? It would probably just get deleted.

(That's a death every 33 feet of construction, for 25 miles...)

https://www.unitedfruitcompany.com/biographies/the-seldom-re...

selimthegrim2• 2 years ago

I will see that and raise you the president’s house at Tulane University

advisedwang• 2 years ago

The Alien Tort Statue [1], the reason this case [2] is in the US at all has sometimes been used for significant environmental and social justice global legal activism. Because of this, it is in the sights of the conservative legal movement. Sadly I suspect this case may end up at the supreme court and end up another victim of the removal of redress for the evil of the powerful.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/alien_tort_statute

[2] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/4232180/in-re-chiquita-...

o11c2• 2 years ago

Notable claim from part of that link: corporations are persons, but cannot be sued like a person can.

JumpCrisscross13• 2 years ago

corporations are persons, but cannot be sued like a person can

Yes. Just like Californians, non-Americans and children are all natural persons with varying rights, Delaware C corporations, New York non-profits and unions are all legal persons with different rights.

rayiner11• 2 years ago

The statute uses the word “alien” (which generally refers to natural persons) not the word “person.”

phlummox• 2 years ago

The whole point of corporations is that they can sue and be sued like a natural person can - they have legal personhood, and can pursue and defend actions in their own name.

I assume the portion of the first link you're referring to is the section that starts

Courts have also split on whether corporations may be held liable under the ATS.

This is a question about the ATS and its scope specifically; the source is not discussing the nature of corporations generally.

It sounds like the scope of the ATS is fairly ill-defined, and that at various points courts have looked for whatever reasons they could to limit its scope, and whether a corporation was involved has just been one of those reasons.

dmix3• 2 years ago

So basically every corporation operating in the US has to follow US law at all times, regardless of the economic/legal circumstances in other countries?

I can see why that is controversial and almost certainly will be extremely selectively enforced.

ToucanLoucan4• 2 years ago

So basically every corporation operating in the US has to follow US law at all times, regardless of the economic/legal circumstances in other countries?

It is wild to me how some people can throw something like this out as this like, unreasonable and clearly sarcastic question like, what you expect a corporation to follow the law everywhere? And I'm just over here like... yeah? Yeah. I... always did, really, I never considered that if I formed a corporation I could fund death squads in other countries to maintain access to cheap products. What the hell is wrong with you where you thought that was not only desirable, but a normal situation...?

I grew up very conservative and pro-free-market, and honestly a huge part of my transition to being a pinko commie scum was recognizing just how FUCKED big businesses are, especially overseas. Like you have the banal stuff like tax sheltering which is shitty but like, it's just money but then, oh MAN, they get up to some truly horrific shit. Death squads, union breaking, cataclysmic environmental damage, and it's 100% enabled by our system. I hope that this trend continues and we can finally get some justice out of these organizations that have clearly overstepped in so many ways.

mike_d• 2 years ago

Uh, yes? There are dozens of specific US laws that govern this and tons of existing case law that committing a serious crime overseas is punishable in the US regardless of its legality elsewhere.

The Travel Act for example makes it illegal to fly to another country to engage in sexual acts with a minor, even if it is legal in that country. Do you think that is some sort of government overreach?

justinclift4• 2 years ago

It's kind of ironic, as the US wants every other country to follow their laws too sometimes (patents, copyright, probably more).

For the extra cup of strange irony, part of the government in my country (Australia) just tried forcing X to delete posts for everyone globally instead of just not showing them to Australian users. Thankfully the court system told the Aust gov to bugger off due to overreach. ;)

WesternWind2• 2 years ago

I feel like the US government has a legitimate interest in making sure US corporations don't pay paramilitary death squads for drug traffickers, especially ones that the US had designated as terrorist organizations at the time.

I don't think it's really that controversial to prevent US companies from doing this.

But to be clear they had already pled guilty to doing that crime in 2007 (and they also prosecuted the AUC, many AUC leaders were extradited to the US in 2008).

This isn't about enforcement at all, this is them being found liable in a civil class action lawsuit, one brought by families of folks the AUC murdered.

bryanrasmussen7• 2 years ago

So basically every corporation operating in the US has to follow US law at all times, regardless of the economic/legal circumstances in other countries?

wait - was the argument that the laws of these other countries they were operating in required them to fund paramilitary death squads? I must have missed that part.

I'm thinking the slope is not as slippery as feared here.

on edit: Ok I read your Mexican cartel example, slipperiness still not apparent to me how one slides from we hired death squads that killed people to we hired a cartel for protection but the money we paid was put in a big pile of money that cartel used to also fund bad stuff the cartel did that hurt people who were not trying to damage our company.

at any rate the amount of money paid out here having people killed is the usual cost of doing business slap on the wrist considering Chiquita's size and doesn't actually affect them. The negative publicity is worse.

kjkjadksj5• 2 years ago

There are certain crimes that might take place outside the US that the US enforces on US citizens/entities. E.g. war crimes.

pyrale• 2 years ago

Non-US corporations are held to the same standard. US court making frivolous jurisdiction claims is nothing new.

rayiner11• 2 years ago

Because of this, it is in the sights of the conservative legal movement

I suspect the problem is more that the statute gives U.S. courts jurisdiction over conduct that happens in foreign countries, and applies incomprehensibly vague standards such as “the law of nations.” It’s a statute that made sense in 1789 when it was enacted by a bunch of people that thought God made universal law applicable to the whole world.

saghm• 2 years ago

It’s a statute that made sense in 1789 when it was enacted by a bunch of people that thought God made universal law applicable to the whole world.

Yet the same people who are likely to be responsible if this law does get thrown out are totally fine with plenty of other laws that make a lot less sense today than in 1789. Let's not pretend that the same court who ruled that all firearm regulations need to be interpreted in the context of what people would have thought in the 18th century[1] would rule differently on a case covering the law we're discussing because of legitimate legal reasoning; they're happy throw out precedents from the most recent couple of centuries in favor of regressing to some ancient historical standard when it ends up with the result they want.

[1] https://apnews.com/article/politics-mississippi-state-govern...

freejazz11• 2 years ago

1789 when it was enacted by a bunch of people that thought God made universal law applicable to the whole world.

Yet they passed legislation... what an absurd comment. By this logic, why regard the constitution at all?

Log_out_• 2 years ago

" Sadly I suspect this case may end up at the supreme court and end up another victim of the removal of redress for the evil of the powerful."

I find it deeply ironic that such morally guided policy unravells a power projection machine only to then be replaced by another powers power projection machine void of values. A power that engages in values mimicry on the surface level and copies the colonial strategies it condemns. And in the end, the morally just but powerless are just written out of history. All the good intentions and they will have never existed.

Some kissinger minion will remove us from the internet archives to have a more correct history for the great leader. And lets not forget the physical, real disasters of antirealpolitics in Europe. Everyone scrambles to get nukes that idealists declared redundant.

In this game the moral and decent loose totally if they allow one player to gain enough power to flip the gameboard. Worser still the moral rightous ones become defacto usefool gamepieces rambling about "red lines & rules" of the opponents, while the littlefingers and kissingers play this game with one arm tied back. The blood in Ukraine is on your hands too, oh moral ones.

jc6• 2 years ago

Not really. Read Pareto's Circulation of the Elites.

The mistake is assuming all those who have some amout of power all have the same agenda.

Such a state is never possible purely because people's personalities, needs, values, environment exist in a wide spectrum. Littlefingers and kissengers loose something everytime they win.

Its like a virus cant kill the host without killing itself.

pjc503• 2 years ago

what?

throwawaycities• 2 years ago

Back in my law school days I was part of our school’s Immigration and Human Rights Clinic that won a $22M judgment under the Alien Tort Statute Act on behalf of Liberian torture victims against “Chuckie” Taylor, son of Liberian President Charles Taylor.[1]

The background is the stuff of movies, Charles Taylor was a high ranking official in Liberia that fled to the US after being accused of embezzlement (principally from US contracts), he was arrested in the US and “escaped” from Federal prison, fled back to Africa where he was armed and funded by Gaddafi, and became President of Liberia after a coup. His campaign slogan was "He killed my ma, he killed my pa, but I will vote for him.”

In fact both Charles and Chuckie are depicted in the Movie Lord of War, where Chuckie was the one who asks Nicolas Cage for the Rambo’s golden gun. Their brutality was also depicted in Blood Diamond, in neighboring Sierra Leon where they were behind Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and would cut people’s arms off (long sleeve/short sleeves for above/below the elbow) when they voted in elections, because voters hands/thumbs were inked as evidence of voting.

Chuckie interestingly was actually a born in the US and a private school kid. Then went to Liberia after Charles became President and became head of his anti-terrorists unit called the “demon forces”, the rest is the stuff of nightmares they leave out of the movies.

If you can read between the lines, this stuff goes to the highest levels of government and intelligence which is another reason the ATS Act is under attack.

[1] https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/2010/02/fiu-im...

dventimi11• 2 years ago

Through at least two administrations, Republican and Democrat, Bush and Obama, the U.S. has funded anti-leftist militarism in Colombia, to the military and to paramilitary groups like AUC. It's not just a fruit company and it's not just a relic from the past.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/12/21/co...

caycep• 2 years ago

last 2? weren't they toppling latin American governments since Teddy Roosevelt?

dventimi11• 2 years ago

Yes. That's why I wrote, "Through at least two administrations". Personally, I consider the scale of injustice in Latin America alone at the hands of U.S. policy to be vast and unsparing in the culpability it lays at the feet of every American. I recognize that not everyone will be joining me out on that limb, however, so I chose to make my opening bid smaller but more unassailable.

lazide3• 2 years ago

Banana republic the term was coined in 1904 - right when Teddy was in charge.

Excellent reference!

refurb7• 2 years ago

Absolutely. The Monroe Doctrine was a clear statement that foreign influence in the Americas was a non-starter.

The USSR was funding leftist rebels in several central and South American countries throughout its existence - Argentina, Grenada, Guatemala, the list goes on.

Doesn’t seem odd to me for the US to come in and back the current government?

Even if those governments weren’t democratic, I don’t think anyone can argue the Soviet backed ones were going to be beacons of liberty either.

FactKnower69• 2 years ago

The JFK admin and CIA were openly committing terrorism on Cuban soil ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mongoose ), at the same time the Joint Chiefs of Staff were begging Kennedy to let them perform terrorist attacks on Americans(!), to be blamed on the Cuban government ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods ); that plan was apparently just a little too far over the line to get green lit

9cb14c1ec0• 2 years ago

The term banana republic comes from Chiquita history in various countries, in case you didn't know.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic

danlugo922• 2 years ago

Theyve done bad things but in this case thry actually de-bananified Colombia (not !00% though).

oblio• 2 years ago

It's so sad that it's used to disparage these smaller countries that were just bullied by the US. Victim blaming.

ImHereToVote• 2 years ago

To add insult to injury, these countries are then lectured at by rich Western governments. Easy to lecture when you don't get couped every time you elect a social-democrat politician.

dmix3• 2 years ago

During the 2007 trial, it was revealed that Chiquita had made payments amounting to more than $1.7m to the AUC in the six years from 1997 to 2004.
The banana giant said that it began making the payments after the leader of the AUC at the time, Carlos Castaño, implied that staff and property belonging to Chiquita's subsidiary in Colombia could be harmed if the money was not forthcoming

Not saying this is the case here but imagine if Mexico allowed families harmed by cartels to sue every businesses that paid off cartel mobsters threatening to ruin their business, because they happen to operate in areas where the police/army consistently fail to control them and the gov/police often colludes with the cartel.

AUC is pretty notorious for penetrating the Colombian gov and law enforcement at varying levels.

xvector7• 2 years ago

Agreed, punishing someone because they were extorted under threat to life and property makes no sense.

If someone threatens to kill your employees and burn everything you own to the ground - and you know they will - you're gonna pay them.

The government of Columbia should be held to account for allowing this evil to run rampant, not the victims of these cartels.

JumpCrisscross13• 2 years ago

If someone threatens to kill your employees and burn everything you own to the ground - and you know they will - you're gonna pay them

No, you withdraw from the country. Maybe you bring in a hostage negotiator to exfiltrate your staff. But paying the bribe and then continuing to do business with a foreign terrorist organisation is not grey area stuff.

caf4• 2 years ago

When I saw the headline I assumed this was going to be about practices from the "banana republic" era in the 60s.. almost unbelievable that they were still doing this in the 21st century.

kjkjadksj5• 2 years ago

Why would they stop when the punishment is a paltry fine, and all their bananas remain in every grocery store in the country?

notatoad• 2 years ago

in the six years from 1997 to 2004.

so not like, historical atrocities from the era most people think of when they say "banana republics". current-era atrocities, perpetrated by people who probably still work at the company today.

xvector7• 2 years ago

It is clear that most HNers aren't reading the article. This has nothing to do with the UFC's "banana republic" atrocities, and seems to be a rather unjust situation:

- Chiquita was forced to pay "protection money" to the AUC. Read: "pay us or we kill your employees and burn your plantations to the ground."

- Chiquita makes the payment and alerts the Department of Justice that they were forced to pay under duress.

- The AUC kills 8 people, as cartels tend to do.

- Chiquita is held accountable.

This does not seem reasonable: First you get extorted at threat to life/property, then you get punished for getting extorted. Furthermore, it's tenuous at best to say "8 people died because you paid the AUC." The AUC kills/maims/tortures children every day for fun. This is not an exaggeration, most people will never comprehend the sheer evil of these organizations.

Calling for the execution[1] of Chiquita execs as some HNers are doing is absurd. Should Chiquita just let their employees get tortured to death and watch their properties burn to the ground?

Perhaps the government of Columbia itself should be responsible for not exterminating its cartels, and instead allowing them to infiltrate the deepest ranks of its military and government.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40663586

AngryData• 2 years ago

I read the article, and the fact that they continued sending payments even after that group was designated a terrorist organization by the US government seems pretty egregious to me, and gives me very little faith into their claim that they were forced into payment, rather than wanting to pay and fund them to combat Chiquita's political opposition. With their company's history they should be hyper-aware about what they are doing when they give money to paramilitary groups that run large drug trafficking operations.

xvector7• 2 years ago

The DoJ actually acknowledges the payments were made under duress, but it is still technically a violation. The AUC absolutely threatened to kill their employees.

boffinAudio3• 2 years ago

So all future acts of imperialist aggression can be spooned off as "being in defense of our employees"?

You do realize this same justification has been given for the invasion of sovereign nations, and their destruction, since the beginning of time?

dcastm• 2 years ago

I'm surprised that most of the previous comments assume they could have just not paid and faced no consequences.

I grew up in a town where these groups had significant influence. It was very common to see businesses, both big and small, paying a "vacuna." Not paying could lead to kidnapping, intimidation, or even death for the owners or operators of the business.

lentil_soup• 2 years ago

it's Colombia, not Columbia

kjkjadksj5• 2 years ago

$38 million fine for funding paramilitaries for a company that commands a little under $2 billion in revenue a year is a total joke of course. Then again if these US courts were actually worth their salt and not total kangaroo courts, they'd hold the US liable for funding paramilitaries in Latin America as well.

bimguy• 2 years ago

Just more hypocracy from the US. US have been funding and training paramilitaries in just about every continent for decades now. Don't your government have anything better to do then throw their weight around the global arena?

bluSCALE42• 2 years ago

Lol? What about avocados?

bluSCALE42• 2 years ago

You guys do realize cartels are selling avocados, growing them in protected forrest, killing grounds keepers, all the while murdering majors, governors, judges, police, basically terrorizing the nation and we're worried about 99 cent for a bunch of bananas while avocados are running up to 3 dollars each?

ETH_start• 2 years ago

Social justice campaigns like this lead to capital flight from less politically stable and economically developed regions of the world.

sensanaty• 2 years ago

The punishment being fines is criminal in and of itself.

Everyone involved needs to be locked away for a long, long time, not have to pay pennies as "punishment"

barbarr• 2 years ago

Also if you take a step back, it's more like the US is getting a cut of the $, almost like profit sharing.

mavili4• 2 years ago

US is the same country that kills Iraqi civilians and requests money for the bullets from the Iraqi government that they control indirectly.

US is an evil empire.

freejazz11• 2 years ago

The legal (il)literacy on HN is astounding. The punishment isn't a fine, it's a civil judgment being awarded to the eight Colombian families that sued... this is the third paragraph in the article:

"Following a civil case brought by eight Colombian families whose relatives were killed by the AUC, Chiquita has been ordered to pay $38.3m (£30m) in damages to the families."

generationP• 2 years ago

Keep in mind that any company operating in Russia (paying taxes, providing data to "law" enforcement, etc.) would fit the same jumpsuit.

We could go that way, but it would be a serious change of rules and create its own perverse incentives.

cies• 2 years ago

Paying a terrorist org or doing business in a unaligned country is a very different story.

The US needs certain things from Russia: it's not that all trade has been sanctioned. Just trade that does not have enough lobby power to protect it.

kalium-xyz• 2 years ago

Its a step in the right direction.

folkrav• 2 years ago

How is it a step in the right direction? If anything, it just sets a precedent - this is how much you should expect to pay in fines for committing atrocities.

0dayz• 2 years ago

I would imagine that will be a bit hard as I assume most involved is either dead or too old to stand fit for jail.

But this is a civil case so they can't get more than money.

Honest what is disgusting is the chump change they are getting 38 mil only for the insane amount of profit the company gained.

Moru• 2 years ago

Another cost of doing business

hulitu2• 2 years ago

I think you missunderstand the "everybody is equal in front of law".

If i make a crime, i go to jail. If a company does it, it gets a pat on a back and an insignificant fine. (exceptions - Volkwagen - apply).

nradov• 2 years ago

The court decision requires payment of damages to the plaintiffs, not a fine. This was a civil case. In the US court system, fines are a criminal matter.

sharpshadow• 2 years ago

That might be the reason why we find some much cocaine in banana shipments in Europe.

hi-v-rocknroll2• 2 years ago

Merely a sliver of the total suffering through coups, wars, and corporate exploitation imposed on Central and South American countries in the spirit of America's Monroe Doctrine colonialism project spanning 200 years.

hi-v-rocknroll2• 2 years ago

Follow-up:

America isn't solely responsible for the decline of the indigenous population of the New World from ~130 million to ~15 million.

Check out what Spanish did a few centuries previously, annihilating ~8 million of indigenous and millions African slaves: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Short_Account_of_the_Destruc...

Lots of blame to go around. It's essential to know all of the uncomfortable parts of history and to avoid repeating them.

forinti• 2 years ago

I guess it's a sign that the CIA and the US military don't do their dirty jobs for them anymore.

In another 100 years they might actually get a real sentence.

lupire2• 2 years ago

This is essentially paying taxes to the local government for national security.

It's the same thing US residents do, with the same abusses by the government.

barbazoo• 2 years ago

Lawyers for Chiquita argued that the company had no choice but to pay the AUC to protect its Colombian employees from violence.

They had the choice between not doing business there and paying the criminals. They chose paying the criminals.

silexia• 2 years ago

I see the lies of Communists have now expanded from our public schools and infected the population as a whole. These US companies did massive amounts of good in terrible environments they worked in and now that has been twisted around.

Banana giant Chiquita held liable by US court for funding paramilitaries

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