The bloody history behind the $38 million Chiquita verdict

The execution of banana plantation worker “David” by right-wing Colombian paramilitary members in 1997 was as swift as it was brutal.

The execution of banana plantation worker “David” by right-wing Colombian paramilitary members in 1997 was as swift as it was brutal. Minutes after his bus was stopped at a checkpoint in the coastal region of Urabá, he was dragged off, beaten to death in front of his fellow passengers, and dumped on the side of the road – where his killers covered his corpse with a banana plant. Cows would later feed on his body, according to court documents. The brutality did not end there. His daughter and sister-in-law disappeared weeks later, never to be found again. Death threats were made to another member of the family. What was left of the family soon left Urabá for good. He was just one of thousands of people targeted by the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, an infamous right-wing terrorist group that, at the height of Colombia’s civil conflict around the turn of the century, was able to mobilize tens of thousands of fighters. More than a quarter century later, a landmark civil case in a US federal court this week found banana company Chiquita Brands International liable for financing the paramilitary group, and ordered Chiquita to pay $38.3 million in compensation to “David’s” family and those of seven other victims – whose real identities were concealed in court documents.