Despite the news that Elon Musk has submitted a bid to acquire Twitter Inc TWTR, a trial between Tesla Inc TSLA CEO and the acquisition target is still on.
What Happened: Judge Kathaleen McCormick sent a notice to counsel in the court case involving Musk and Twitter that the scheduled date of October 17 would begin the highly anticipated trial.
The parties have not filed a stipulation to stay the action, nor has any party moved for a stay. McCormick said that I continue to press on toward our trial set to begin on October 17, 2022.
The announcement came after it was revealed that Musk proposed to buy Twitter again on Tuesday for $54.20 per share.
Related link: Twitter Sues Elon Musk: How Chuck Norris, Memes, Poop Emojis and Texts Play A Role In A Major Court Case
Why It is Important: McCormick notes the text messages that were revealed recently from Musk talking about the Twitter acquisition.
The judge also mentions messages sent via Signal.
With respect to Signal, Plaintiff argues that Musk sent or received Signal messages and that their deletion or non-production amounts to sanctionable spoliation.
The plaintiff's Twitter claimed there were missing texts in the documents from the defendant.
Defendants conceded as much but stated that these incomplete logs were preliminary and were produced in the interest of time. The judge said this was believable, given the two-day time limit put forth by the judge. The plaintiff called attention to several people not shown in the text log, including Morgan Stanley bankers and Musk s attorney Alex Spiro.
For the avoidance of doubt, Defendants are ordered to produce or log any messages that are responsive to Plaintiff's requests. There were no texts produced between May 24 and May 30 or June 1 and June 7, which Twitter said shows gaps in the text log and likely missed texts discussing the acquisition.
These periods were important to the parties dispute and I share Plaintiff s concern that Musk produced no responsive text messages from these periods, according to McCormick.
Musk is ordered to produce non-SMS instant messages and iMessages.
With respect to Signal, Plaintiff argues that Defendants failed to produce Signal messages raises an inference that Musk deleted relevant messages that he was obligated to preserve. Despite the plaintiffs finding Signal was used to discuss potential financing of the deal, the defendants told counsel they did not recall sending or receiving any other messages relating to the merger through Signal. Musk said he has not intentionally deleted any e-mail, text or other communication related to the acquisition.
The defendants told the judge they were investigating the ability to get Signal messages that were automatically deleted back.
If Defendants deleted documents after they were under a duty to preserve, some remedy is appropriate, but the appropriate remedy isn't clear to me at this stage, McCormick said.
The judge has put the full focus on the pending court date of October 17.
Musk s acquisition letter to Twitter stated that he would pay $54.20 per share if Twitter agreed to adjourn the trial and all other legal proceedings related thereto pending the closing or further order of the court. As of the time of writing, Twitter has not announced if it will accept the new proposal.
TWTR Price Action: Twitter shares are down 1% to $51.63 on Wednesday.