LOS ANGELES (AP) – With the potentially record-breaking $2 billion sale of the Los Angeles Clippers hanging in the balance, a trial beginning Monday will focus on whether Donald Sterling’s estranged wife had the authority under terms of a family trust to unilaterally negotiate the deal.
Shelly Sterling struck a deal to sell the Clippers to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer after Donald Sterling’s racist remarks to a girlfriend were publicized and the NBA moved to oust him as team owner.
In order to do so, she had two doctors examine her 80-year-old husband and they declared him mentally incapacitated and unable to act as an administrator of The Sterling Family Trust, which owns the Clippers.
The terms of the trust say incapacitation can be determined by two licensed doctors without ties to the family who are specialists in their field. A trustee must cooperate with such exams.
The judge must find that Shelly Sterling acted in accordance with the trust and that the deal still applies – even though the trust has since been revoked by Donald Sterling – for the sale to proceed.