The battle for control of the Los Angeles Lakers between the Buss siblings has grown ugly.
Days after Jeanie Buss effectively fired Jim from his role with the organization, she has obtained a temporary restraining order against brothers Jim and Johnny to stop them from holding a meeting to elect a new board of directors without her. The proposed meeting was apparently an attempt to seize control of the organization from her, according to Nathan Fenno and Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times.
The Buss brothers had apparently planned to elect a new board that would have excluded Jeanie. The controlling owner of the franchise must sit on the board of directors, meaning Jeanie could have lost that title had her brothers succeeed. The organization as a whole is controlled by a family trust, which has the power to elect three of the board’s five members.
“This is no doubt the beginning and not the end of the game-playing,” Jeanie Buss’s attorney Adam Streisand told the Los Angeles Times. “They don’t have a legal leg to stand on. This is a legal strategy doomed for failure.”
ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne further explained the legal wrangling.
Here's what happened in Lakers family court today. Short answer: Jeanie won when the older brother's lawyers withdrew their motion
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
Long answer: Jim, Johnny and Jeanie are the three trustees for the Buss family trust which owns 66 percent of the Lakers.
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
The older brothers argued they had the votes (2-1) to elect new directors for the team. An emergency meeting was called for March 7
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
Jeanie's lawyers argued the trust states she's the controlling owner. AND–this is key– the controlling owner also must be a director
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
So removing Jeanie Buss as a director would be in violation of the trust's provision that the controlling owner also be a director. Get it?
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
Jeanie's lawyers filed a temporary restraining order arguing that Johnny and Jim were acting in breach of their fiduciary duties as trustees
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
Jim and Johnny then dropped their motion and cancelled next week's meeting to elect new directors for the Lakers.
— Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) March 3, 2017
Jeanie Buss instituted wide-ranging changes to the organization, replacing her brother with Magic Johnson and putting him in charge of basketball operations. The Buss brothers seem intent on looking to every possible avenue to undo those changes, and this is an indication that things could get very ugly quickly.
