Posted on 02/24/2005 10:28:21 PM PST by NormsRevenge
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Billionaire investor Ron Burkle sued Michael Ovitz on Thursday, claiming the former Walt Disney Co. president breached an agreement to invest in Internet businesses and to allow Burkle to buy into his talent agency and the Google search engine.
The suit, filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court, seeks unspecified damages.
Ovitz's attorney, James Ellis, said the allegations are "baseless and false."
"The lawsuit was filed in retaliation for Mr. Ovitz having come forward with facts which revealed that Mr. Burkle and his affiliates had breached their fiduciary duties and engaged in other unlawful activities," Ellis said in a statement.
He did not specify the alleged activities.
The suit contends that Ovitz made an oral agreement with Burkle in the 1990s to combine "their skill, money and knowledge" on investments.
Each would be allowed to acquire 50 percent of any Internet-related or online technology projects that Ovitz or Burkle considered, the suit contends. Each also would have a chance to acquire 10 percent of any other business ventures being contemplated.
According to the lawsuit, Ovitz and his company, CKE, never put "even one cent" into two Internet companies in which Burkle invested in 1998 and 1999.
Ovitz, co-founder of the powerful Creative Artists Agency, once was considered among the most powerful men in Hollywood. He left CAA in 1995 to become president of Disney but was fired after only 14 months. A shareholders' lawsuit, now being heard, contends that Disney's board was negligent in agreeing to a $140 million severance package.
Ovitz later began Artists Management Group, brokering film and television deals with its own roster of stars.
Burkle's lawsuit claims Ovitz never gave the billionaire a chance to invest in Artists Management Group. The suit also contends the sale of the company in 2002 yielded about $12 million.
Burkle's suit further claims that he discovered last year that Ovitz had deprived him of an opportunity to invest in Google.
>>"The lawsuit was filed in retaliation for Mr. Ovitz having come forward with facts which revealed that Mr. Burkle and his affiliates had breached their fiduciary duties and engaged in other unlawful activities," Ellis said in a statement.
Hmmm... is that what is buried in the sealed divorce records?
Just one more thing that makes ya go.. HMMMM?
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