The termination of the $44 billion acquisition proposal has been requested in a third notification that Tesla CEO Elon Musk has sent to Twitter, which is overseen by Parag Agrawal.
Musk’s legal team mentioned Twitter’s multi-million dollar severance payout to former security head and whistleblower Peiter “Mudge” Zatko in the most recent letter that was shared with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
According to The Verge, the notification was sent to Vijaya Gadde, who serves as chief legal officer at Twitter.
The notification said that on June 28, 2022, Twitter agreed into a separation agreement with Peiter Zatko. According to the terms of the agreement, Twitter provided severance payments to Zatko and his counsel that totaled $7.75 million.
The legal team representing Musk highlighted this as just additional justification for terminating the arrangement.
In addition, the CEO of Tesla is attempting to delay the beginning of the trial against Twitter, which was originally scheduled to begin on October 17, by claiming the forthcoming testimony of Zatko.
The legal team representing Musk has requested a fresh schedule that would move the trial, which is scheduled to last one week, to the end of November.
On September 13, Zatko is scheduled to appear before the United States Congress to speak about the claims that he made against the microblogging site.
According to allegations made by a former head of Twitter security, the company has been misleading authorities over its security methods and the real number of bot accounts.
In the continuing legal battle between Twitter and Musk, Zatko has also been served with a subpoena by Musk’s legal team, which requires him to attend on September 9 for a deposition related to the case.
Musk has said that the evidence provided by the Twitter whistleblower explains his decision to cancel the $44 billion plan to purchase the microblogging site.