Watch the video below, it is quite something. Amazing that they were stupid enough to tape themselves saying this much less turn it into a documentary!
UPDATE: The legal pleading has been added, link below, quite a read.
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Excerpt From Wizbang: Environmental Scientist Caught Agreeing To Ignore Her Own Data, Make Up New Claims
Dr. Ann Maest is a managing scientist at Straus Consulting, and she’s the go to expert on all things groundwater. In the press release announcing her reappointment to the National Academy of Sciences, they mention that she is focused on the environmental effects of mining and petroleum extraction and production, and, more recently, on the effects of climate change on water quality.
Maest is in high demand as an expert for those looking to stop oil and mineral exploration. She’s also heavily used by the federal government, even though after new details about her past work are coming to light as a result of a lawsuit. From The New York Times:
An environmental consulting firm named as a defendant in a racketeering suit filed by Chevron Corp. over a landmark pollution lawsuit in Ecuador is continuing to work on another blockbuster case: the Deepwater Horizon oil spill investigation.
Boulder, Colo.-based Stratus Consulting, a long-term contractor with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other federal agencies, is gathering and analyzing data concerning the Gulf of Mexico spill.
Chevron is suing those behind the Ecuadorian case including: the lead attorney Steven Donziger; Stratus Consulting; and Maest. As part of their lawsuit, Chevron obtained through discovery, outtakes from a documentary called “Crude” that show Donziger and Maest colluding ignore their own findings and make up some new unsubstantiated claims. Watch this:
from the YouTube description:
The following is an outtake from Joe Berlinger’s movie Crude. At the March 4, 2007, lunch meeting between plaintiffs’ lead U.S. lawyer Steven Donziger and plaintiffs’ U.S. consultants Charles Champ, Ann Maest and Richard Kamp, they reveal the truth about plaintiffs’ lack of evidence and their intent to manipulate the Ecuadorian court. Maest tells Donziger that they need evidence of groundwater contamination, because plaintiffs did not submit any. Maest admits that, “Right now all the reports are saying it’s just at the pits and the stations, and nothing has spread anywhere at all.” Donziger responds, “Hold on a second, you know, this is Ecuador. … You can say whatever you want, and at the end of the day, there’s a thousand people around the courthouse. You’re going to get what you want. Sorry, but it’s true.” Donziger continues, “Because at the end of the day, this is all for the court just a bunch of smoke and mirrors and bulls**t. It really is. We have enough, to get money, to win.” View more outtakes at YouTube.com/TexacoEcuador. For more information about the Ecuador lawsuit, visit Chevron.com/Ecuador
Read the whole thing at Wizbang: Environmental Scientist Caught Agreeing To Ignore Her Own Data, Make Up New Claims
Here’s the legal pleading, quite a read h/t to Steve
http://www.chevron.com/documents/pdf/ecuador/StampedComplaint.pdf
The lives and times of an environmental scientist…………
I better learn more real math like statistics so I can get government hand outs too!
I am a testifying expert on groundwater, groundwater contamination, fate and transport of organic chemicals in groudnwater, and I work extensively for the extractive industries and I have NEVER had an attorney make such statements to me, even when there were NO cameras around. As the President of a State Licensing Board for Geologists I can’t afford to even think about such things so to me, this is just unthinkable.
Unbelievable!
Oh, wait. These are environmentalist consultants, so what they are saying is ‘all-in-a-day’s work’.
Of course it is “believable”. Silly me for thinking otherwise.
Richard
Seems to be standard fare for so many (environmental) scientists. Like many consultants for business and government, the first step seems to be to find out where the money lies. Step two is to determine what conclusion the business owners/department heads want. Step three, determine the conclusion that will most likely loosen the purse strings. Step four; make the science fit the conclusion.
Somehow this reminds me of those kids who beat someone to a pulp in a subway station, film it on their own cell phone and promptly post it to YouTube.
Post Normal Science?
There’s that word again, ‘extrapolate’. Shameful and criminal.
I am an engineer who does legal expert witness work from time to time and while I have never seen or heard of such blatant collusion between counsel and expert I have unfortunately read a lot of so called evidence that is clearly concocted to suit the narrative of the engaging party. Typically such evidence omits logical reasoning and proper reference to data relying on bald opinion to sketch out a suitable narrative or at least support the team.
It seems to me that scientists and engineers and other technical professions need specific training in the basics of giving evidence, their relationship to the court in question and keeping a proper distance between their commercial self interest and the objectivity of their evidence.
That said, this matter about takes the cake.
More of a political scientists than an actual one.
That whole lawsuit just reeks. It’s lawyers and lobbyists all the way down. Even the “Amazon Defense Coalition”, nominally the plaintiff, is just an astroturf front for a Washington lobbying company called Hinton Communications. The plaintiffs lawyers actually wrote what was purported to be an independent engineer’s technical assessment, and paid him to sign it. The address of the “laboratory” that did the water analysis turned out to be an apartment block. And on and on.
There really is serious ongoing pollution in the area, caused by PetroEcuador, the state oil company, and whatever happens with the Chevron suit isn’t going to have any effect on that.
I was an expert witness once. The barrister who briefed me started off by saying “You mustn’t dream of acting like an American expert witness”. Sad but true.
The science is settled! Haven’t you received the message? hee hee
If anyone here was wonder why the XL pipeline was delayed – then venture no further. These are the kind of people the Obama administration have covering the fat butts. And paid FOR by US taxpaers to stop American growth and job creation strictly to appease the eco-Nazis wing of Obama’s democrats.
More evidence Global Warming is false.
I’m sorry, but we need to see the NEXT minute. We need to see her response to his bafflegab, or transcripts of testimony, or other corroborating details that indicate that she bought into this.
It’s clearly crap, but we need a little more detail to see who willingly stepped in it.
Like Tom G, I am simply flaberghasted that a lawyer would make such a comment, especially on camera. I’m not surprised by the lack of moral outrage by the activists though.
wow . . with that kind of “honesty” they would be able to hide many declines.
“When there’s a Higher Purpose things like honesty take the back seat”. Was it Pol Pot saying that?
Videos like these expose the amateurs and give me some respect for organized criminals.
“I’m sorry, but we need to see the NEXT minute.”
“Crude” is available on Netflix streaming. See if the next minute is shown.
Jeremy said on December 13, 2011 at 2:42 pm:
You respect career politicians loyal to their political “family”?
😉
Wow! I started in Environmental Studies, went to grad school in Geology, and ended up working for big oil. I guess I’m someone who almost ended up a street thug but got my life straightened out.
Is this for real ? How was the movie taken or is it being played by actors ?
The high moral ground is a land where, clearly, ethics don’t grow anymore. Maybe there’s been a climate change.