Steve Ballmer continues to face mounting legal troubles over the Kawhi Leonard case and an alleged financial scheme involving the company Aspiration, said to have been designed to bypass the NBA’s salary cap and secretly pay Leonard additional money to secure his signature with the team.
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According to journalist Pablo Torre, in a report aired Monday night, November 3, eleven investors from the now-bankrupt firm Aspiration, currently operating under the name Catona, have filed a lawsuit accusing Ballmer of covertly funneling money to Leonard.
The complaint states:
The arrangement was that Ballmer would be an investor in Catona and in return, Ballmer would use Catona to secretly funnel millions of dollars to star NBA player Kawhi Leonard. These funds would be channeled through Catona to Leonard so that Ballmer could induce Leonard to re-sign with the Clippers by covertly paying him more than allowed by the NBA’s salary cap rules.
The lawsuit also claims that Ballmer assisted Aspiration’s founder, Joe Sandberg, in constructing the fraudulent operation.
It also served Ballmer’s interest in getting extra money to Leonard so he could circumvent the salary cap, beat out the competition, and re-sign his team’s superstar player. Ballmer was complicit in and aided and abetted Sanberg’s fraud for his own self-serving purpose. Ballmer publicly endorsed Catona and infused over $50 million into the company. Absent Ballmer’s support, Catona could not have sustained the frauds set forth herein.
The accusations against Sandberg by federal authorities
Joe Sandberg has been charged by federal prosecutors with orchestrating a $248 million fraud scheme. He pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud earlier this year.
Meanwhile, the plaintiffs claim they were deceived into believing their investments would fund legitimate business operations and not an illicit channel for Ballmer to secure Leonard’s commitment to the Los Angeles Clippers.
Ballmer transferred other funds to Catona to keep the company afloat and buy Sanberg’s support, cooperation, and silence about the secret deal with Leonard. The full extent of Ballmer’s transfers of funds to Catona and Sanberg will be ascertained in discovery.
Pablo Torre has followed the case closely from the beginning, providing ongoing updates as new revelations emerge. His reporting has been instrumental in exposing the details behind the allegations, which continue to draw national attention.
For its part, the NBA has reportedly launched an internal investigation to determine what transpired and whether Ballmer violated league financial regulations. Meanwhile, as the case unfolds, the Los Angeles Clippers owner faces deepening scrutiny, and the accusations against him threaten to drag him further into one of the most complex scandals involving a team executive in recent NBA history.
