Man Sued Winklevoss Twins in 2009, Saying They Stole Company Stake From Him

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40593836/ns/business-us_business/

by aepstein • 16 years ago

67 14 16 years ago

msnbc.msn.com

aepstein• 16 years ago

The actual court docs, if you're in to that kind of thing: http://www.businessinsider.com/irony-alert-man-sues-winklevo...

alanh• 16 years ago

Summary: The man (Chang) said ConnectU (the Winklevoss venture) joined with his company and the litigation was an asset, but he received none of the settlement.

An interesting argument. IANAL but it sounds like a compelling case.

ajaimk• 16 years ago

Hmmm the wonderful sound of irony.

AndrewMoffat• 16 years ago

cues Yakety Sax

arrty• 16 years ago

Why did he wait this long?

MichaelApproved• 16 years ago

Filing a lawsuit isn't always the first action, typically it's the last resort. There could have been negotiations and other attempts to come to a settlement before finally suing in court.

ewjordan• 16 years ago

He didn't wait terribly long: he filed in Dec 2009, and IIRC the ConnectU settlement was in early 2009. Between finding a lawyer, tracking down details and all that, I don't think that's a very long time between the action and a lawsuit related to it.

lotusleaf1987• 16 years ago

Awesome, this has to be karma.

rayval• 16 years ago

Per the comments in the link, this story is almost one year old, and was first covered by Caroline McCarthy of CNET

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10424028-36.html

grellas• 16 years ago

This suit was filed in December 2009 and I'm not sure why it is being reported now as if it were a new filing.

The procedural context is intriguing, though. Among other things, when the court fights first started, Facebook sued ConnectU, the Winklevoss brothers, and Mr. Chang for what is known as declaratory relief. This is a special court remedy by which a party can anticipate that another party will sue for relief and beat that party to the punch by suing first. The point of the preemptive suit is to file in a favorable venue and ask the court to consider and resolve the conflicting claims to the subject matter in dispute (here, the rights to FB's assets). Thus, Facebook sued all these parties in order to get a declaration (and judgment) from the court that neither ConnectU nor any other party had any rights to the FB assets but that, instead, Mr. Zuckerberg and FB owned all such assets free and clear of any of their claims. This included asking for such a declaration against Mr. Chang as well.

According to the allegations in Mr. Chang's suit, the Winklevoss brothers retained counsel to defend the declaratory relief action and also paid for such attorneys to represent Mr. Chang as well. Mr. Chang then alleges that his own attorneys sold him out in favor of the Winklevoss brothers by failing to advise him properly concerning the settlement that was ultimately reached in the case by which the brothers received a huge payout and he got nothing (he claims that he and the brothers had formed an entity into which the assets of ConnectU, including the FB-related rights, were transferred and that he therefore owned up to half those assets and should have received up to half the settlement proceeds as a result of this).

So you have claims that the Winklevoss brothers stole what belonged to Mr. Chang, that Mr. Zuckerberg then stole what belonged to the brothers and Mr. Chang either separately or jointly, and that the attorneys representing the brothers and Mr. Chang connived with the brothers to stick the knife into Mr. Chang while extorting a massive payout from FB. And, to cap it off, the brothers and ConnectU have moved to set aside this settlement because they claim the Mr. Zuckerberg misled them about the value of the FB stock when he did the settlement.

Definitely one for the books.

ttol2• 16 years ago

Very thorough research. -Wayne Chang

ttol2• 16 years ago

Why am I getting downvoted?

candre717• 16 years ago

If Wayne was a programmer - a good one at that -, why did the twins hire Zuckerberg

Man Sued Winklevoss Twins in 2009, Saying They Stole Company Stake From Him

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