Marco Simons's blog

As I noted last week, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Mohamad v. Palestinian Authority that only human beings - not corporations or organizations - could be sued under the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). Yesterday, the Supreme Court denied our petition for certiorari in Bowoto v. Chevron Corp., which means an end to that lawsuit. Read more about As expected, Bowoto v. Chevron petition is denied after Mohamad decision

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled today in Mohamad v. Palestinian Authority that the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA), which allows suits in federal court for torture and extrajudicial killing, only allows suits against human beings - not corporations or other entities. Read more about US Supreme Court rules that corporations cannot be sued for torture and extrajudicial killing

Court orders Kiobel case reargued and asks whether human rights cases arising in other countries can be heard

Editorial Note: This morning the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch-Shell, a case which we have blogged about extensively over the past 18 months. Several of our staff members were in attendence, and four of them wrote brief initial impressions. This is one of those four.

Read more about Reactions to Kiobel @ SCOTUS #1: No corporate impunity

On Wednesday, Marissa noted that the Lago Agrio plaintiffs - the 30,000 victims of Chevron's toxic legacy in the Ecuadorian Amazon - had taken the step of filing a petition against the Ecuadorian government with the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, asking the Commission to ensure that Ecuador compels Chevron to pay the court-ordered costs of cleaning up its mess. Read more about Private arbitration panel ignores human rights, gives Ecuador unprecedented order to shield Chevron from Amazon cleanup costs

In November 2010, Rick and I blogged about the Oklahoma constitutional amendment that would ban state courts from considering foreign law, especially Sharia (Islamic law), as well as international law. As Rick noted at the time, the amendment was very likely unconstitutional. Read more about Federal Appeals Court Confirms That Oklahoma "Sharia Ban" Is Unconstitutional

On Monday, I wrote about the big news that the Supreme Court will hear the Kiobel case, about whether corporations may be sued for complicity in human rights abuses under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS). Read more about Another court allows corporate liability for human rights abuses

As Rick noted in his post last week, the big news out of the Supreme Court is that it will decide whether corporations can be sued for human rights violations under the Alien Tort Statute and the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). Read more about All eyes on corporate liability at the Supreme Court

It's a good day for justice against oil company abuses. Read more about Chevron loses appeal in effort to stop Ecuadorian judgment

This summer, ESCR-Net and NYU Law School's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice launched the Business and Human Rights Documentation Project, or B-HRD ("Be Heard").  ERI has long been a member of ESCR-Net, and I'm serving on the advisory board for B-HRD, so this is a pretty exciting development. Read more about New online portal focuses on business and human rights advocacy