Nikola Founder Trevor Milton stands trial on fraud charges — Transcript

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1. 0:00foreign
2. 0:00[Music]
3. 0:02we've got Yahoo finances Alexis Keenan
4. 0:04with me here in studio uh this is pretty
5. 0:07damning testimony when you think about
6. 0:08the current CEO saying I just didn't
7. 0:10trust Trevor Milton's words right and
8. 0:13this testimony not good at all for
9. 0:15Trevor Melton now what Mark Russell is
10. 0:18saying and this is according to the Wall
11. 0:20Street Journal is reporting on the case
12. 0:21he said that he tried to curb Melton's
13. 0:25statements through an arrangement
14. 0:27whereby Russell would become the CEO if
15. 0:31Nikola went public and of course the
16. 0:33company did go public and so that caused
17. 0:35that to go into effect and the reason
18. 0:37that Russell said he wanted to do that
19. 0:39was to stop Milton from being a
20. 0:42mouthpiece for the company realizing how
21. 0:45a potentially damaging his statements
22. 0:48could be he said according to the Wall
23. 0:50Street Journal that Milton was prone to
24. 0:52exaggeration and he wanted to ensure
25. 0:55that he cut off that uh those statements
26. 0:58from being made on behalf of the company
27. 1:00so another Witness also testified and is
28. 1:04a threat I would say considered to
29. 1:06Milton's case and that was a Critic and
30. 1:08engineer Paul Lackey who at one point
31. 1:11opened up a Twitter feed to try to post
32. 1:13what he thought would be more revealing
33. 1:15and transparent statements about the
34. 1:17company he actually had called into the
35. 1:20producers to find out how that video was
36. 1:23made now what we're talking about is a
37. 1:25video that Trevor Melton had promoted uh
38. 1:27showing his Nikola one truck prototype
39. 1:29going down a hill and it turned out
40. 1:32through the research by Paul Lackey that
41. 1:35that truck was towed up a mountain and
42. 1:37videoed going down not on its own
43. 1:39propulsion and so that was considered to
44. 1:41be a misrepresentation one of many that
45. 1:43prosecutors say Milton made among his
46. 1:46other alleged misrepresentations he uh
47. 1:49they said he lied about all aspects of
48. 1:51the company that he lied about the
49. 1:53hydrogen power that these the company
50. 1:55would have been making Milton had said
51. 1:57that they they were producing their own
52. 1:59hydrogen power when in fact they hadn't
53. 2:00been producing at all also saying that
54. 2:03they were producing some in-house
55. 2:04batteries that turned out not to be true
56. 2:06as well so this trial just shaping up to
57. 2:09be very tough for Milton to defend but
58. 2:12on the other hand he has not made his
59. 2:13case yet so we'll see what his Witnesses
60. 2:16have to say and whether he'll take the
61. 2:17stand