Altor is sued by the singer over alleged stock sale fraud after the Florida-based company made medical breakthrough.
- Oct 1, 2017
AceShowbiz - Cher is furious at biopharmaceutical company Altor. According to Los Angeles Times, the singer/songwriter files a lawsuit against the Florida-based company, accusing them of duping her into selling back her stock for "an unreasonably below-market price."
The 71-year-old star reportedly bought Altor's minority stock back in 2013. She sold her shares in January 2016 at $1.50 each, for a total of $450,000. The share price has since skyrocketed after the company made promising progress in cancer and HIV/AIDS treatment.
Altor is now reportedly worth over $1 billion. The cofounder Hing C. Wong and boardmember Fred Middleton, along with Patrick Soon-Shiong, an L.A. billionaire who acquired the company's outstanding shares for $15 million, are named defendants in the lawsuit.
"The lawsuit has no merit," Soon-Shiong's rep said in response to the impending legal battle. "We intend to vigorously defend against it." Soon-Shiong is also a major stockholder of Tronc Inc., which owns the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and other big news outlets.
Cher stayed mum on the matter. Instead, she took it to Twitter to slam President Donald Trump over his response to San Juan Mayor's plea for help after Hurricane destroyed Puerto Rico and its surrounding areas. "Trump attacks San Juan mayor.HES NEVER KNOWN HUNGER,THIRST,DIRT,NO PHONE, OR WATCH A SICK CHILD DIE 4 LACK Of MEDS," she wrote.
Trump attacks San Juan mayor.HES NEVER KNOWN HUNGER,THIRST,DIRT,NO PHONE, OR WATCH A SICK CHILD DIE 4 LACK Of MEDS. https://t.co/QXCFhjLYL0
— Cher (@cher) September 30, 2017
San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz said on Friday, September 29, "I am begging, begging anyone who can hear us to save us from dying. If anybody out there is listening to us, we are dying, and you are killing us with the inefficiency and the bureaucracy." She added, "I am done being polite. I am done being politically correct. I am mad as hell."
Trump fired back at Twitter, "The Mayor of San Juan, who was very complimentary only a few days ago, has now been told by the Democrats that you must be nasty to Trump. Such poor leadership ability by the Mayor of San Juan, and others in Puerto Rico, who are not able to get their workers to help. They want everything to be done for them when it should be a community effort. 10,000 Federal workers now on Island doing a fantastic job. The military and first responders, despite no electric, roads, phones etc., have done an amazing job. Puerto Rico was totally destroyed."
Meanwhile, Trump said earlier this week, "This is an island sitting in the middle of an ocean - and it's a big ocean, a really, really big ocean." He echoed his statement at a speech later in Washington, "This is an island surrounded by water, big water, ocean water." He added that the local goverments had been "totally and unfortunately unable to handle this catastrophic crisis on their own - just totally unable to."
