maui

Revealed: A Secret Monsanto Document in the Maui GMO Case

Imagine you are a lawyer arguing a case before a judge. There is no jury. The judge will decide the outcome.

The judge tells you, “Look, the other side, your opponents in this case, have filed documents with me. These documents are at the heart of their argument. I can’t allow you to read the documents. I can only give you access to heavily redacted versions. You’ll have to do the best you can. I have read the full documents. Your opponents, of course, know every word of those documents. But you don’t. And you won’t. Good luck. Limp along as well as you can.”

April 10, 2015 | Source: Jon Rapport | by

Imagine you are a lawyer arguing a case before a judge. There is no jury. The judge will decide the outcome.

The judge tells you, “Look, the other side, your opponents in this case, have filed documents with me. These documents are at the heart of their argument. I can’t allow you to read the documents. I can only give you access to heavily redacted versions. You’ll have to do the best you can. I have read the full documents. Your opponents, of course, know every word of those documents. But you don’t. And you won’t. Good luck. Limp along as well as you can.”

That’s what we’re talking about here.

(The link to the document is located at the bottm of this article.)

Last Election Day, the people of Maui County voted to halt all local GMO and pesticide experimentation being carried out by Monsanto and Dow.

During the temporary halt, a complete independent investigation would be done, to find out exactly how harmful the pesticides and GMOs were.

But the legal and binding vote was suspended, because Monsanto and Dow immediately sued.

The case is now hung up in Federal Court.

I’ve just learned that Monsanto filed documents “under seal,” to make its case in the proceeding now before Federal Judge Susan Oki Mollway.

Monsano requested the court make the documents secret, and the previous Judge, Barry Kurren, agreed to it.

Here, in legalese, is Kurren’s decision:

    “ORDER GRANTING PLAINTIFFS’ EX PARTE APPLICATION TO FILE UNDER SEAL IN PART THE DECLARATIONS OF SAM EATHINGTON, JESSE STIEFEL, AND ADOLPH HELM IN SUPPORT OF PLAINTIFFS’ MOTION FOR TEMPORARY RESTRAINING ORDER AND PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION re 13- Signed by Judge BARRY M. KURREN on 11/14/2014.
    ‘IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Plaintiffs’ ex parte application is GRANTED. Accordingly, the subject declarations shall be filed by the Court under seal, and redacted versions may be filed with the Plaintiffs’ Motion.’”

That means the lawyers for the voters of Maui can’t see those Monsanto documents. Not in full. They can only read redacted versions of Monsanto making its case for continued GMO/pesticide experiments on Maui—contravening the demands of Maui voters.

What kind of court is this?

Judge Mollway, who will decide the case, can read everything Monsanto offers in its defense, but the lawyers against Monsanto have no full access and, therefore, can’t argue their side from full knowledge.