Two institutional shareholders said Monday they filed suit against AOL Time Warner, accusing Chairman Steve Case and other top executives of insider trading while using "tricks, contrivances and bogus transactions" to inflate the company"s share price.
The University of California and Amalgamated Bank"s Longview Collective Investment Fund said in a statement that they filed the suit in California Superior Court in Los Angeles. In addition to AOL Time Warner and Case, the lawsuit also names as defendants Vice Chairman Ted Turner, CEO Richard Parsons, former CEO Gerald Levin, and former Chief Operating Officer Bob Pittman.
The complaint alleges that the defendants reaped nearly $1 billion by selling shares while using "tricks, contrivances and bogus transactions"" to inflate the company"s shares, according to a statement issued by Milberg Weiss, the law firm representing the university and the bank.