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Cher Is Suing One Of L.A.'s Richest Men For Alleged Stock Sale Fraud
Cher performing at the 2017 Billboard Awards. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
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In a story that seems destined to be adapted into a The Big Short-style financial drama, legendary pop singer and Twitter hero Cher is suing Patrick Soon-Shiong—a Brentwood-based doctor who, until this year, held the title of richest person in Los Angeles—for stock sale fraud.
Cher filed a lawsuit against Soon-Shiong and several higher-ups at Altor, a Florida-based biopharmaceutical corporation, in Los Angeles Superior Court on Friday, the L.A. Times reports. Cher sold her shares in Altor back to the company in January 2016 for a total of $450,000, with Soon-Shiong then acquiring the outstanding shares of Altor for roughly $15 million. Altor has skyrocketed in value since Cher's sale and is now worth over 1 billion, according to the suit.
Cher is alleging "fraudulent concealment and breach of fiduciary duty" against Soon-Shiong and several Altor board members, claiming they asked her to sell her shares without informing her that compounds of an Altor drug were showing promise in treating cancer and AIDS/HIV in clinical trials.
Although Cher sold her shares willingly, the lawsuit calls her sale rate of $1.50 per share "an unreasonably below-market price," CNBC reports. If she could turn back time... (I'm sorry. I had to.)
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A spokesperson for Soon-Shiong told the L.A. Times that the lawsuit "has no merit," but if the legal battle with Cher drags on, at least Soon-Shiong has that sweet $8.4 billion net worth to arm himself with. Soon-Shiong's current net worth is a precipitous drop from 2016, when he was valued at $15.4 billion, but it's still enough money to keep Cher in Bob Mackie evening gowns in perpetuity.
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