The court listening to the sale of Nikola electric trucks bankruptcies to Lucid Motors would go smoothly on Friday. There had been no objections to the transaction, and Delaware’s bankruptcy judge thomas Horan approved it verbally without hesitation.
Until, that is, a lawyer who rushed to call the zoom towards the end of the hearing.
The lawyer said his client “has some concerns” about how the auction process was carried out. These could be dealt with later, he said, but stressed that he did not want his client to be “held against us in the future”.
The lawyer represented ISSO LLC, an entity that Nikola Trevor Milton’s founder uses to evaluate an offer for his former company assets. In the context of this process, Nikola had already been ruled out from the Arizona plant – a decision that Judge Horan was last week.
While the approval of the sale in Lucid was cool, the late appearance by Milton’s spokesman was a bad sign that he had not pushed to his former company.
Fresh by a favor by President Donald Trump, who helped him avoid serving a four -year prison sentence, it is likely that Milton could try to fight a $ 168 million arbitration award ordered to pay Nikola last year.
This arbitration award remains a key element of the bankruptcy case of Chapter 11 of Nikola. Prior to bankruptcy, Nikola was able to settle a category lawsuit by shareholders associated with false allegations that Milton did while serving as the company’s chief executive. But he was able to do so promises to distribute this arbitration award to these shareholders.
Nikola still has some assets she hopes to sell after the transaction. Lucid bought the Coolidge, Arizona, Factory and Phoenix headquarters, as well as construction equipment. It will also hire about 300 Nikola employees. However, Nikola continues to maintain the census of large hydrogen -powered installations and other varied equipment.
Joshua Morris, a lawyer for Nikola, said during the hearing that he was not surprised by ISSO and Milton “would like to try and infect these procedures”.
“This is a pattern of behavior we have seen again and again,” Morris said. “We believe they are unfounded allegations. When they are asked for any proof or any specialty, no one was given.
Morris continued to say that he believes that Milton’s involvement in the sales process seems to be “an attempt to continue to hurt the company for a benefit that I cannot ascertain”.
He added that Milton could transfer a pall for the sale process in the hope of affecting this arbitration award.
‘Maybe the game will do [Nikola] desperate for support cash so that the committee [of unsecured creditors] It forces the debtor to attempt or accept a low ball settlement proposal, “he said.” We know that we believe we have done the sale process with an opening and concern all parties. “
The lawyers left things there and let the hearing end. A Milton spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comments.
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