Ownership of the XFL may have changed hands, but previous owner Vince McMahon is still in litigation with former CEO/Commissioner Oliver Luck. Luck charges that he was wrongfully terminated from his position just days before the league officially announced they would be filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
According to Daniel Kaplan of TheAthletic.com, the ongoing lawsuit between Oliver Luck and Vince McMahon has focused on access to the password to Luck’s company phone.
In the case, Luck is suing to retrieve the balance left from his $35M contract with the XFL. McMahon says that the company sued Luck for cause, making the allegation that Oliver Luck, as acting CEO and Commissioner of the XFL, used his company iPhone for personal purposes, which they say is in violation of company policy.
A hearing will be held later this week on whether Luck must provide the password to the phone.
The full contents of [the phone] are relevant to showing that Luck was properly terminated for cause under his Employment Contract because he grossly neglected his duties after March 13, 2020 — when Luck effectively abandoned his responsibilities as XFL Commissioner and CEO and returned home to Indiana despite the existential threat to the league posed by the COVID-19 pandemic,” McMahon’s lawyers wrote in court filings, via Kaplan. “Examination of the data on the iPhone will show Luck’s activities during this critical time period when he was not in the office and demonstrate that he failed to ‘devote substantially all of his business time to the performance of his duties to the XFL’ as required by his Employment Contract.”
McMahon is targeting a Connecticut statute that allows employers to access data on company-issued phones, and to require employee passwords for those phones. Luck argues that he wasn’t employed by Vince McMahon or Alpha Entertainment, rather by the XFL. In previous court filings we learned that Luck made McMahon and Alpha express parties to his contract, so that the obligation would survive the bankruptcy filing that ultimately occurred.
Something to remember, this does not impact the current XFL ownership group. This is direct litigation between McMahon and Luck, regardless of the outcome the league will not be involved. As we mentioned previously, there will be a hearing later this week on this matter. Once we have more information, we’ll keep you posted.
Do you think Oliver Luck is owed the remainder of his contract due to wrongful termination? Let us know down in the comments below or join the conversation on Discord.
