The litigation judge said on Wednesday that the trial was still scheduled for October 17 as long as the social network and the boss of Tesla had not officially requested a stay of proceedings.
The judge in charge of litigation between Twitter and Elon Musk said Wednesday that the trial was still scheduled for October 17 as long as the social network and the boss of Tesla have not officially requested a stay of proceedings. Elon Musk wrote to Twitter on Monday offering to buy the company as originally planned, for $44 billion, as long as the board ends his lawsuit and he gets the necessary funds.
But at this point,the parties did not request the interruption of the proceduresaid Judge Kathaleen McCormick in a letter to attorneys Wednesday. “So I continue the preparations for the trial“, she added. Twitter filed a complaint against Elon Musk in early July, to force him to honor his commitment made two months earlier. The multibillionaire had just announced that he was ending it, assuring that Twitter had lied to him on certain subjects, in particular the proportion of fake accounts on the platform, which the company denies.
Elon Musk is supposed to be questioned, this Thursday, behind closed doors by the lawyers of the social network. They asked for sanctions against the contractor, whom they accuse of not having provided all the necessary information, in particular messages sent via the Signal application, known for respecting confidentiality. “I am forced to conclude that it is probable“that the people in charge of storing messages related to the case”allowed the automatic deletion of communications on Signal (…) and that they were therefore irretrievably lost“, notes the judge. She demands that the Tesla boss’s lawyers provide certain missing exchanges but reserves her decision on possible sanctions.
Read alsoTwitter: Elon Musk ready to do anything to avoid a lawsuit
Elon Musk had offered in the spring to acquire the platform for 54.20 dollars per share, thus valuing it at 44 billion dollars. The board of directors, very reluctant at first, ended up accepting. Before Tuesday, everything indicated that Twitter was on track to win in court against the tempestuous businessman.
SEE ALSO – Elon Musk presents Optimus, Tesla’s humanoid robot, destined for “millions” of copies