During Elon Musk’s contentious $44-billion buyout of Twitter last year, Twitter’s parent company, X Corp., sued a law firm hired by Twitter’s former management.
A lawsuit filed Friday accuses Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, an elite corporate law firm, of exploiting Twitter by charging $90 million in legal fees for “a few months” of services rendered.
Wachtell arranged to line its pockets with funds from the company cash register while the keys were being handed over to the Musk parties, the lawsuit alleges.
In July, Wacthell, a mergers and acquisitions firm, was hired to enforce Elon Musk’s $44-billion purchase of Twitter‘s At that time, Musk tried to walk away from the deal because of problems with some of Twitter’s financial disclosures.
On October 27, Musk will complete the buyout.
For helping Musk close the deal, Wachtell charged the company an $84.3-million success fee and a $16-million hourly fee.
In an email attached to the court documents, former Twitter director and board member Martha Lane Fox expressed shock after former general counsel Sean Edgett forwarded the fees.
In response to Edgett’s email, she wrote, “O My Freaking God!”.
X Corp.’s lawsuit against Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz includes a copy of an email. San Francisco County Superior Court.
According to the lawsuit, Twitter’s lame-duck board voted to approve Wachtell’s excessive and unconscionable fee despite any initial shock.
Outside of working hours, Lane Fox did not respond to a comment request.
Minutes before the deal closed, $84 million was wired to the law firm.
Musk accused Wachtell of specializing in “institutionalized corruption” on Twitter.
In addition to the legal fee, Musk has refused to pay expenses for former employees, rent for the company’s offices, and invoices for Google Cloud services since acquiring the company.
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