A North Dakota jury has found Greenpeace liable for defamation, ordering it to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to a Texas-based oil company for its role in one of the largest anti-fossil fuel protests in US history.
Energy Transfer accused the environmental group of defamation, trespass, nuisance and civil conspiracy over the protests nearly a decade ago against the Dakota Access Pipeline.
The lawsuit, filed in state court, argued that Greenpeace was behind an “unlawful and violent scheme to cause financial harm to Energy Transfer”.
Greenpeace said last month it could be forced into bankruptcy if it was ordered to pay around $300m (£237m) in claimed damages, ending over 50 years of environmental activism.
Protests against the pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation drew thousands, but Greenpeace argued it did not lead the demonstration and that the lawsuit threatened free speech.
The nine-person jury reached a verdict on Wednesday after roughly two days of deliberating.
The case was heard at a court in Mandan, about 100 miles (160km) north of where the protests took place.
Trey Cox, a lawyer for Energy Transfer, said during closing arguments that Greenpeace’s actions caused between $265m to $340m in damages. He asked the jury to award the company that amount, plus additional damages.
Construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline gained international attention during President Donald Trump’s first term, as Native American groups set up an encampment trying to block it from passing near Standing Rock.
The protests, which saw acts of violence and vandalism, started in April 2016 and ended in February 2017, when the National Guard and police cleared the demonstrators’ site.
At the peak, over 10,000 protesters were on site. The group included more than 200 separate Native American tribes, hundreds of US military veterans, actors and political leaders – including the current health secretary, Robert F Kennedy, Jr.
During the five-week trial, jurors heard from Energy Transfer’s co-founder and board chairman Kelcy Warren, who said in a video deposition that protesters had created “a total false narrative” about his company.
“It was time to fight back,” he said.
Energy Transfer’s lawyer Mr Cox told the court that Greenpeace had exploited the Dakota Access Pipeline to “promote its own selfish agenda”.
Attorneys for Greenpeace argued that the group did not lead the protests, but merely helped support “nonviolent, direct-action training”.
In response to the verdict, Greenpeace USA’s senior legal adviser Deepa Padmanabha said in a statement that “lawsuits like this aimed at destroying our rights to peaceful protest and free speech”.
The legal action named Greenpeace USA, as well as its Washington DC-based funding arm Greenpeace Fund Inc and its Amsterdam-based parent group Greenpeace International.
Energy Transfer had sued over the protests once before in 2017, arguing that demonstrators had violated a racketeering statute, an allegation more often made against organised crime cartels. But a judge dismissed that case.
Greenpeace has counter-sued Energy Transfer in Dutch court, claiming the oil firm is attempting to unfairly use the legal system to silence critics.
The lawsuit, filed earlier this month, seeks to recover all damages and costs.
Greenpeace International’s general counsel Kristin Casper said in a statement on Wednesday that “Energy Transfer hasn’t heard the last of us in this fight”.
“We will not back down, we will not be silenced,” she said.
