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Carlos Watson, a co-founder of the digital media start-up Ozy Media, testified on Monday at his fraud trial that he had not conspired to trick buyers.
As an alternative, he stated, his younger media firm employed methods to construct partnerships, safe promoting income and attract buyers.
“We actually thought we had an opportunity to do one thing particular that could possibly be round a very long time,” Mr. Watson informed the jury.
Mr. Watson’s testimony is the middle of his protection in opposition to prices that he misrepresented his firm’s monetary outcomes, fund-raising and viewers knowledge to buyers and lenders from 2018 to 2021. The prosecution has referred to as quite a lot of witnesses, together with potential buyers who testified that Mr. Watson had misled them concerning the firm in an try to safe funding.
Mr. Watson, who has pleaded not responsible to all the costs in opposition to him, may resist 37 years in jail if convicted.
Talking earlier than a jury in federal courtroom in Brooklyn, he denied purposely deceptive anybody.
Mr. Watson, who can be a former MSNBC anchor, careworn his private dedication to the media start-up, which he stated had included monetary investments and wage cuts to reveal he was “all in.”
“It’s a problem whenever you’re attempting to construct one thing completely different to draw assist,” Mr. Watson stated, including that the problem was even higher for a Black entrepreneur like him.
Mr. Watson launched Ozy with Samir Rao in 2013. The beginning-up revealed information articles and newsletters earlier than venturing into podcast and tv productions. It secured commitments from outstanding buyers at a time when digital publishers, like BuzzFeed and Vice, attracted billions of {dollars} in investments that largely didn’t pan out.
On the coronary heart of the federal legal trial is an incident in 2021 when Mr. Rao, who was Mr. Watson’s deputy, misled Goldman Sachs staff throughout a fund-raising name by impersonating a YouTube govt. The disclosure of the decision, first reported by The New York Occasions, precipitated the collapse of Ozy.
Legal professionals for Mr. Watson and Ozy have blamed Mr. Rao for the impersonation and for misrepresenting Ozy’s financials to potential buyers. Shannon Frison, a lawyer for Ozy, stated in her opening assertion in Might that Mr. Rao was “incompetent for the function that he was serving.”
Mr. Watson portrayed himself on Monday as an attentive chief, however somebody faraway from a lot of his firm’s day-to-day operations. He “couldn’t get into the weeds” when coping with broader strategic planning, whereas Mr. Rao and different staff typically dealt with the start-up’s funds and know-how, Mr. Watson testified.
Mr. Rao and Suzee Han, a former Ozy chief of employees, pleaded responsible final yr to fraud prices.
A number of of the prosecution’s witnesses additionally testified that Mr. Watson had misrepresented his firm’s financials to safe investments.
The best-profile witness, Sundar Pichai, the chief govt of Google, testified that he had by no means mentioned a attainable $600 million takeover of Ozy. Prosecutors stated Mr. Watson had informed a potential investor that Mr. Pichai made that provide.
Mr. Watson is predicted to proceed his testimony on Tuesday, together with a cross-examination from the prosecution.
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