The Uzan family owns 73.5% of the shares in Telsim, Turkey's second largest mobile phone company. Since 1998, Motorola has been supplying the company with equipment and $2 billion worth of financing to build its network. Nokia added another $1 billion of financing.
But Telsim did not repay the loans, so Motorola and Nokia sued the family owners, alleging fraud and racketeering.
In a scathing ruling that runs to 172-pages, US District Judge Jed Rakoff wrote:
"Under the guise of obtaining financing for a Turkish telecommunications company, the Uzans have siphoned more than a billion dollars of [Motorola's and Nokia's] money into their own pockets and into the coffers of other entities they control."
He continued:
"Having fraudulently induced the loans, they have sought to advance and conceal their scheme through an almost endless series of lies, threats, and chicanery, including, among much else, filing false criminal charges against high level American and Finnish executives, grossly diluting and weakening the collateral for the loans, and repeatedly disobeying the orders of this Court."
