“The regular payments continued even after the AUC was designated by the US as a foreign terrorist organisation in 2001.”
Chiquita paid the AUC more than $1.7 million from 1997 to 2004 and pleaded guilty to it in 2007. It took 17 more years for a Florida jury to tie the money to eight murdered men and award their families $38.3 million. That case covered nine of hundreds of claims. Chiquita says it was extortion and plans to appeal. Victims of extortion do not usually expand into the extortionist’s territory.