A former best friend, Trevor Milton, was found guilty on 3 of 4 counts of fraud. He will face his prison sentence sometime in January. It is a reminder that life is so much easier when you live it with radical integrity. I was on the Nikola roller coaster basically from day one. I was $500,000 of the original 2.5 million that started the company. I hoped it would work for years and ultimately sold all my shares the second I could after being an emotional wreck for months. This post isn't about me, though; it's about Trevor. I don't think he's a bad guy. Trevor had a vast idea and an incredible truck design. He had a unique ability to sell his vision, which got many people on board -- Myself included. His idea blew up way faster and more extensively than he expected. He had a multi-billion dollar evaluation of a business in its infant stages. But, lie after lie started stacking up. He rolled a truck down the hill, selling the badger as a truck he had created when in reality, it was nothing more than a drawing. He told me that he had made a battery that would allow a Tesla to go over 1000 miles between charges. All obvious lies now. I don't believe Trevor wanted to be a con man. His problem was the thousands of victims that bought into his story and the lies that lost all their money once it was exposed to be false. With great power comes great responsibility and when you are the CEO, you can't just make shit up because you want it to be true. Trevor talked a lot about being bullied when he was younger. He started getting a lot of attention and fame, poured gasoline on the fire, and started picking fights with everyone from Elon Musk to "trolls with Trevor" (don't even get me started) I do believe the jury got this verdict right. Sadly I didn't make it to the sell date before it collapsed and I lost 85% of the value from the peak. I got out fine even if it was $695 million less than Trevors' other investor, putting in the same amount as me, two weeks apart. That money wasn't supposed to be mine... That $695 million would have come from retail investors that had invested based on the lies Trevor told. My heart goes out to Trevor. I watched him tip generously and raise money for causes like O.U.R. I watched him stay after my July event to jump-start a little Latin family whose truck battery had died. Nobody is all good or all bad. Trevor is a kid that wants to be loved, wants people to see how smart he is, and wants to fit in. He wanted friends; he loved his family and was great to me 90% of the time. He also could be straight cold-blooded and vengeful, and he couldn't help himself; he often lied, including to his best friends, as he did me. 20 months ago, when I discovered what he had done to me, I asked him to meet and talk about it... He refused and told me I had to speak to his lawyers. That was the last time we spoke. Who in their life gets to be on this crazy adventure for the past six years?
It is OK to condone behavior. It is OK to speak the truth of one’s character. In this particular case a ConMan, who was incredibly deceitful was caught. There’s nothing that can support why anyone should accept this type of behavior. There’s no reason to applaud it. There’s no reason to look beyond it, and try to find some glimpse or shadow of do-gooder. The morale of the story is good character prevails, and Trevor is not that.
There are so many things wrong with this post it deserves a full breakdown
How much money did you make off this fraudulent company? When did you learn that Milton was lying to investors? Did you blow the whistle or keep quiet until the SPAC merger so you could cash in?
It’s hard to find the line between vision and lie. It is easy to believe your own fiction. And the more people who jump on board the harder it is. The story takes on a life of its own. Often this process is part of being a good leader. You motivate people and fake it until you make it. But it can also be fraud. And it is a trap that is hard to escape once it gets out of control. I think prison is the wrong way to handle such things. If it is the first time then I can believe the person didn’t do it intentionally. Some sort of community service, teaching people that this kind of thing is a real risk, is probably better. And some sort of effort to compensate those that were harmed.
Why don’t donate your profits to those who were scammed by him. If you don’t you are as bad as him.
The best con is the one where those being conned don't know they're being conned. He conned people he didn't know as well as those closest to him. In the end, Trevor cared about no one but himself and pretty soon he'll find out how long he's going to sit in a cell by himself. All those friends, and family, who where there for him for years (the ones he conned), won't be writing letters, won't be visiting, and won't be throwing some money on his commissary account. When the all mighty dollar is the most valued thing in your life, you'll never be wealthy or happy.
This sounds to me very much like the Elizabeth Holmes story with Theranos. She was always pretending to be something and someone she is not - her whole life. While I agree that no one is all good or all bad, this is far too big a ruse to be something he got carried away with. Like Holmes, greed and desire to be seen as a Steve Jobs or Zuckerberg type drove them to do whatever it took to make themselves look how they wanted people to perceive them. There is an underlying egomaniacal thing that warps their morality and ethics. Bad choices often times leads to horrible consequences, and he will have that on his back for the rest of his life. And the people he defrauded have to live with the fact that they believed this shyster.
Owner at GetaCDLjobtoday.com/Paragon Transportation LLC
2yCurious what putting him in a cage will do? Right... Nothing. Weird how people are led to believe there is actually "justice" He needs to pay pack as much as he can and he can do that much faster than making 13 cents an hour handing out commissary