The Saks Global unsecured creditors committee appears to have gotten the information it was looking for from Richard Baker and Ian Putnam and dropped its bankruptcy rule 2004 demand for documents.
The committee — which includes some of Saks Global’s largest vendors, like Chanel Inc. and LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, but represents all vendors left holding the bag when the retailer went under — has been poring over everything in the case, looking for sources of value, including the proceeds of potential lawsuits.
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Baker, the former Saks Global chairman and chief executive officer and architect of the $2.7 billion deal to buy Neiman Marcus Group, moved last month to quash the subpoena. His lawyer argued that he left the company on Jan. 13, the day it filed for bankruptcy, and that he had no relevant material that was not already in the retailer’s possession.
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“No ‘fishing expedition’ should be conducted here,” said Rachel Strickland, Baker’s attorney at Ropes & Gray.
The request for information was broad, covering 13 categories, including “all documents and communications between you and Marc Metrick,” another former Saks Global CEO, as well as information “relating to the acquisition of Neiman Marcus.”
Putnam, the former CEO of Saks Global Properties & Investments, had a similarly long list of requests, including for details on the $5 million bonus he received for the Neiman Marcus deal, all of his communications with Baker and all documents related to the Authentic Luxury Group joint venture and HBS, another joint venture set up with Simon Property Group Inc.
The latest court filings on the matter indicate that Baker and Putnam “made certain productions of documents” last month, satisfying the request. Putnam also sat for an interview.
But the committee is keeping its options open, reserving “all rights to serve additional discovery requests on Mr. Baker, whether pursuant to Rule 2004 of the Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure, in connection with a contested matter or adversary proceeding in these Chapter 11 cases, or otherwise.” The same goes for Putnam.
Strickland did not respond to a WWD request for comment.
Just what the committee is looking into and what, if anything, comes from all this remains to be seen.
But the unsecured creditors have something of a war chest to work with.
As part of negotiations to develop a plan for reorganization, a litigation trust was set up with $20 million from Saks Global. If the trust turns up any money, it first goes to pay that back and is then split between debtor-in-possession lenders and unsecured creditors.