Probate Judge Sets Hearing For Shelly Sterling's Right To Sell Clippers
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com/AP) — A probate judge Wednesday set a hearing for July 7 to determine if Shelly Sterling can legally sell the Los Angeles Clippers.
Sterling's lawyer will ask a judge for an emergency order to validate her takeover of the family trust, authorizing her to sell the team to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer for $2 billion.
On Sunday, her estranged husband, Donald Sterling, said he would not agree to the sale and reinstated his $1 billion federal lawsuit against the NBA for breach of contract.
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He said in a statement Tuesday that he's not just fighting for the Clippers but taking a stand against the NBA, which he called "a band of hypocrites and bullies" and "despicable monsters" who want "to take away our privacy rights and freedom of speech."
Shelly Sterling maintains she is the sole trustee of The Sterling Family Trust, which owns the team. Donald Sterling was stripped as co-trustee after two neurologists last month determined he has dementia and is "mentally incapacitated" under the trust's conditions.
"A PT scan, a CAT scan and a personal examinations were done" to render Sterling as unfit under the trust, Shelly Sterling's attorney, Pierce O'Donnell, said.
"There's not the slightest question in my mind that he's mentally competent," Maxwell Blecher, Donald Sterling's lawyer, said.
Blecher added that his client's wife was only allowed to negotiate an offer for the team, not make a deal.
"He just said, 'What's the point of it all? I never wanted to sell and I'm not going to sell,' " said attorney Maxwell Blecher.
The hearing is expected to last four days.
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