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Nikola founder Trevor Milton sentenced to four years in prison
Dec
Trevor Milton, the founding father of zero-emission truck producer Nikola, has been sentenced to 4 years in jail for a number of counts of fraud.
After U.S. prosecutors final week suggested a sentence of 11 years for Milton, New York-based U.S. District Choose Edgardo Ramos sentenced the Nikola founder to 4 years in jail on two counts of wire fraud and one depend of securities fraud. Milton was discovered responsible within the case final 12 months, and earlier this 12 months, he was ordered to pay $165 million in damages again to Nikola.
Milton has denied wrongdoing and has requested probation, saying he hadn’t supposed to mislead buyers in regards to the capabilities of its electrical semi-truck. He’s additionally anticipated to enchantment the conviction, and Choose Ramos mentioned on Monday that Milton could be allowed to stay free on bail throughout the enchantment course of.
“I used to be not a really seasoned CEO,” Milton mentioned.
The choice follows a collection of incidents in 2019 and 2020, through which Milton offered deceptive particulars about its Nikola One electrical semi-truck. The fraud got here to mild after a video of the Nikola One rolling had surfaced, making the truck appear as if it had been driving, whereas it was later found that, in actual fact, the semi had not been self-propelled in any respect.
Lots of the deceptive statements had additionally been made by way of public YouTube movies and different on-line platforms, making the white-collar fraud case distinctive in comparison with many others through which executives have defrauded buyers by company filings, monetary statements and different official documentation.
After information had surfaced of the fraudulent claims, Milton stepped down as Nikola’s government chairman in September 2020, and federal prosecutors later charged him in July 2021. Milton was officially convicted final October.
Milton requested a brand new trial following the trial’s verdict final 12 months, claiming that the jury had convicted him primarily based on incorrect directions from the choose and including that one juror had even lied to make it onto the panel. The choose denied the request in August.
Nikola shares peaked in mid-2020 at almost $80, inflicting the truck maker’s market capitalization to surge previous $30 billion. Since then, Nikola’s inventory has dropped to underneath $1 per share for a lot of the 12 months, risking delisting from Nasdaq. The inventory shortly rebounded to round $3 in August earlier than dropping again right down to lower than $1.
Nikola CFO resigns in truck maker’s latest executive shake-up
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