Chapter 7 - EVAN’S MOTIVE WAS NOT INHERITANCEEvan did not want Rose dead.
Did not want custody.
Did not expect to inherit her money.
That would have been simpler.
His motive was corporate control.
He had spent four years building a proposed acquisition of Nexora Surgical Systems, our largest European competitor.
If completed, Mercer Adaptive Systems would nearly double in size.
Evan believed it would define his career.
The financing deadline was six weeks away.
One obstacle:
Amelia’s sensor patents.
Nexora needed expanded licensing rights.
Rose’s trustee refused to approve the newest terms without independent valuation.
Evan believed the trustee was overestimating future royalties.
The trustee believed Evan was underpricing them to make the acquisition cheaper.
Maybe both had arguments.
That is what negotiation is for.
Instead, Evan tried to build an alternate structure.
The consolidation agreement would pool Rose’s royalty distributions with company-managed IP revenues.
Not eliminate her economic interest.
But make future accounting much harder to challenge.
And give Evan enormous discretion over timing and valuation.
I asked him later:
“Why didn’t you just negotiate?”
He answered:
May you like
“We were running out of time.”
That sentence has justified an astonishing amount of human stupidity.
