Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks at an event in Hawthorne, Calif., April 30, 2015.
Patrick T. Fallon | Reuters
lawyer Tesla When Elon Musk It is asking a federal judge in San Francisco to move or postpone the trial from Northern California to West Texas, saying it would be unlikely to find an unbiased juror, citing “local negativity” against Mr. Musk. there is
Musk and other current and former Tesla directors are set to face a jury in a shareholder class action lawsuit alleging the CEO manipulated Tesla’s stock in 2018. murmured He said he was considering taking the electric car company private at $420 a share and had “securing the funding” to do so.
Trading in Tesla’s stock was initially halted, and the stock became highly volatile in the weeks following the tweet.
That year, Musk lived in California and Tesla was headquartered in Palo Alto. CEO of Tesla and SpaceX moved residence Moving to Texas in 2020, his electric car company has moved its headquarters to Texas. Austin in 2021.
In 2022, Northern California Senior District Judge Edward M. Chen, who is overseeing the trial, said: Ruling that Musk’s 2018 remarks were false And that he tweeted on purpose.
The upcoming trial and jury panel will now determine whether Mr. Musk’s infamous tweet was material to shareholders, how it affected Tesla’s stock price, and whether the company or its directors could be held liable and awarded damages. decide whether to pay
Lawyers representing Tesla and Musk allege that the CEO gained widespread and negative publicity in California after acquiring Twitter, a San Francisco-based social media company, in October 2022.
Musk appoints himself CEO of Twitter laid off thousands of employees Amid a series of chaotic layoffs and layoffs since the deal closed.
In a recent public appearance in San Francisco, mask was booed After comedian Dave Chappelle invited him on stage.
Quinn Emanuel Urquhart and Sullivan’s partner Alex Spiro, who have represented Musk in several legal matters, claimed in this latest filing:
“A significant portion of the jury pool in this district may have been individual future jurors, or their friends and relatives, personally, as a result of recent dismissals at one of Mr. Musk’s companies. , may have personal and material prejudices against Mr. Musk, an existing baseline bias exacerbated, magnified and reinforced by the negative and inflammatory local propaganda surrounding the event. It has been.”
In the filing, Spiro added, “The negative views of Mr. Musk weren’t just in the press.” He said there are regular protests and pickets in front of Musk’s offices in San Francisco, adding that some are “supported and encouraged by local politicians.”
Musk and his lawyers have previously argued that his comments about a possible Tesla acquisition in 2018 did not violate the law.
CEO of Tesla repeatedly claimed to have made a handshake deal with an investor in Saudi Arabia’s public investment fund Take Tesla private at $420 a share. Text messages revealed in another trial in 2022 Saudi Arabia’s PIF investors have indicated they have not fully agreed to finance the Tesla deal.
Court filings in this month’s securities class action show Musk’s attorneys have. Summoned four people to help run the Saudi Public Investment Fund Testifying at this trial including Naif Al Mogren, Saad Al Jarboa, Turqi Alnowaise and Yasir Al-Rumayyan.
read the filing from In Re: Tesla Inc. Securities Litigation (case 3:18-cv-04865-EMC) here:
