Greenpeace Seeks to Reduce Jury’s Award of $667M in Dakota Access Pipeline Trial

 Greenpeace Senior Legal Adviser Deepa Padmanabha, second from left.  (Amy Dalrymple/North Dakota Monitor)

(By: Mary Steurer. North Dakota Monitor) – Greenpeace wants a North Dakota judge to reduce the nearly $667 million in damages it was ordered to pay the developer of the Dakota Access Pipeline in March, arguing that the award is excessive and unreasonable.

A Morton County jury handed down the sum following a more than three-week trial earlier this year. Jurors found the environmental group at fault for damages related to protests against the pipeline in North Dakota in 2016 and 2017, and for publishing defamatory statements that harmed Energy Transfer’s business.

Greenpeace was one of many activist groups that backed the movement, which drew thousands to rural south-central North Dakota to protest in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

Greenpeace denies Energy Transfer’s allegations and says the company only brought the lawsuit to chill environmental activism. The defendants have yet to appeal.