Dole Food...can’t be forced in the U.S. to pay a $97 million verdict issued by a Nicaraguan court, a federal judge said. The award, won four years ago by 150 Nicaraguans who claimed they suffered injuries from pesticides used at Dole’s banana plantations in the 1970s, can’t be enforced because it was based on a law that violates international legal standards, U.S. District Judge Paul Huck in Miami said in a ruling yesterday. “The law under which this case was tried stripped defendants of their basic right in any adversarial proceeding to produce evidence in their favor and rebut the plaintiffs’ claims,” Huck said. [also refers to Dow Chemical, Occidental Petroleum, Shell]