SAN FRANCISCO, United States —
Elon Musk has served former Twitter boss Jack
Dorsey with a subpoena in a hunt for material to help him get out of buying the
giant social media platform for $44 billion as agreed.
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Records made
public on Monday show Dorsey was served with a legal order to give Musk any
communications or documents related to the takeover deal inked in April, as
well as information touching on false or spam accounts or how Twitter
calculates the number of its active users.
The subpoena
asks for anything Dorsey has on the topics dating back to January of 2019.
Tesla boss Musk,
the world’s wealthiest man, has accused Twitter of fraud, alleging the company
misled him about key aspects of its business, particularly the number of
accounts that are actually spam or automated “bots” instead of people.
Twitter has stuck
by its estimates that bots make up fewer than five percent of users.
Twitter also
disputed Musk’s assertion he has the right to walk away if its bot count is
found to be wrong, since he didn’t seek information on that topic when he made
the buyout offer.
The company
accuses Musk of contriving a story to escape a merger agreement that he no
longer found attractive.
“Musk’s
counterclaims, based as they are on distortion, misrepresentation, and outright
deception, change nothing,” Twitter said in a court filing.
Rival lawyers
have been serving subpoenas for weeks seeking documents or depositions from a
wide range of people connected with the buyout, running Twitter’s business, and
even with a holding company formed by Musk.
Twitter
co-founder
Dorsey in November of last year ended his second stint as chief of
the company and had voiced support for Musk taking it over.
The Twitter deal
included a provision that if the deal fell apart, the party breaking the
agreement would pay a termination fee of $1 billion under certain
circumstances.
Billions of
dollars are at stake, but so is the future of Twitter, which Musk has said
should allow any legal speech — an absolutist position that has sparked fears
the network could be used to incite violence.
The legal fight
is gathering speed as preparations have begun for an October trial in
Delaware’s Chancery Court, which specializes in complex, high-stakes business
battles.
Twitter has
urged shareholders to endorse the deal, setting a vote on the merger for
September 13.
While fielding
questions at a recent Tesla shareholders meeting, Musk was asked whether his
potential ownership of Twitter might distract from his running of the electric
car company.
“I think Tesla,
you know, would continue to do very well even if I was kidnapped by aliens, or
went back to my home planet,” he joked, drawing laughter and applause.
“To be frank, I
don’t have an easy answer,” Musk added.
He assured shareholders
that, for now, he has no plans to leave his Tesla chief role.
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