Perspective: Business & paramilitariesWPB Judge Tosses Suits Accusing Chiquita of Helping Terrorists Kill Colombians

Published 16 September 2019

About 220,000 Colombians were killed in the civil war which raged in Colombia between 1964 and 2016. Most of the victims were killed by two Marxist insurgency groups, the FARC and the ELN. Many, however, were killed by various right-wing paramilitary groups which often coordinated their activities with government forces. A number of Colombians whose relatives were killed by paramilitary violence sued Chiquita Brands International in a Florida court for providing financial assistance to the paramilitary groups. Their hopes for success faded this month when U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra threw out their claims.

About 220,000 Colombians were killed in the civil war which raged in Colombia between 1964 and 2016. Most of the victims were killed by two Marxist insurgency groups, the FARC and the ELN. Many, however, were killed by various right-wing paramilitary groups which often coordinated their activities with government forces. A number of Colombians whose relatives were killed by paramilitary violence sued Chiquita Brands International for providing financial assistance to the paramilitary groups.

Jane Musgrave writes in the Palm Beach Post that for more than a decade, relatives of victims of paramilitary violence have waged a legal battle in U.S. District Court in West Palm Beach in an effort to hold the banana giant accountable for the brutal murders of family members.

Their hopes for success faded this month when U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra threw out claims filed against Chiquita on behalf of 10 Colombians who were murdered. He ruled that the grieving families can’t definitively link their loved ones’ brutal deaths to Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, much less Chiquita.

“Tragically, the geographic areas where (the murders occurred) were brutalized by numerous warring factions over the course of a long and bloody civil war,” U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra wrote in a detailed 73-page ruling.

The families may believe the right-wing paramilitary group, which received $1.7 million from Chiquita, is behind the murders. But, Marra ruled, there is simply no proof.

And, without concrete evidence, he said, he had to throw out the lawsuits filed against Chiquita on behalf of 10 of the thousands of people who were killed.