Closing arguments, which both sides delivered Wednesday, didn’t seem to shift the momentum Terra Firma’s way.
Terra lead counsel David Boies of Boies, Schiller & Flexner did his best to make things interesting. He repeated the allegations from his opening statement, insisting that Citigroup banker David (“The Worm”) Wormsley lied to Terra Firma Capital Partners chairman Guy Hands during three phone conversations in the week leading up to Terra Firma’s $6.4 billion bid for EMI on May 21, 2007. Wormsley is accused of telling Hands that the rival private equity firm Cerberus was going to bid 2.62 pounds a share for EMI under an accelerated bidding schedule. Terra claims it bid 2.65 pounds for EMI to beat the purported Cerberus bid. As it turned out, Cerberus never made an offer, and EMI, struggling mightily under loans from Citigroup, turned out to be a disastrous investment for Terra Firma.
