MANDAN, N.D. — Closing arguments are scheduled to start on Monday in a pipeline company’s lawsuit in opposition to Greenpeace, a case the environmental advocacy group stated might have penalties free of charge speech and protest rights and threaten the organization’s future.
The jury will deliberate after the closing arguments and jury directions. 9 jurors and two alternates have heard the case.
North Dakota District Court docket Choose James Gion advised the jury final month when the trial started, “You’re the judges of all questions of reality on this case,” and to “base your verdict on the proof.”
Dallas-based Power Switch and its subsidiary Dakota Entry alleged defamation, trespass, nuisance and different offenses by Netherlands-based Greenpeace Worldwide, its American department Greenpeace USA, and funding arm Greenpeace Fund Inc. The pipeline firm is searching for a whole bunch of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in damages.
The lawsuit stems from protests in 2016 and 2017 of the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline and its Missouri River crossing upstream of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s reservation. The tribe for years has opposed the pipeline as a danger to its water provide. The pipeline has transported oil since mid-2017.
Trey Cox, an lawyer for the pipeline firm, beforehand stated Greenpeace “deliberate, organized and funded a recreation plan to cease building” of the pipeline, “no matter the fee.”
Cox additionally alleged Greenpeace paid outsiders to come back into the realm to protest, despatched blockade provides, organized or led protester trainings, handed “vital intel” to the protesters and advised unfaithful statements to cease the road from being constructed.
He stated a letter signed by leaders of Greenpeace International and Greenpeace USA and despatched to Power Switch’s banks contained an allegedly defamatory assertion that the corporate desecrated burial grounds and culturally essential websites throughout building.
Greenpeace’s “misleading narrative scared off lenders” and the corporate misplaced half its banks, Cox stated.
Attorneys for the Greenpeace entities denied the allegations, saying there isn’t any proof, that they had little or no involvement with the protests and the letter was signed by a whole bunch of organizations from dozens of nations, with no monetary establishment to testify the group obtained, learn or was influenced by the letter.
Greenpeace representatives have stated the lawsuit is an instance of companies abusing the authorized system to go after critics and is a vital take a look at of free speech and protest rights. An Power Switch spokesperson stated the case is about Greenpeace not following the legislation, not free speech.
