Adelson calls Jacobs “very strange man”
Sheldon Adelson, the 81-year-old founder and chairman of Las Vegas Sands Corp., took the witness stand in the lawsuit against him filed by Steven Jacobs, the former head of Sands China who claims Adelson wrongly fired him for refusing to implement illegal investigations of Macau officials to gain leverage.
Adelson testified that Jacobs was a “very strange man” who “tried to kill the company” by unilaterally cutting out junket operators who supplied the high rollers accounting for most of Sands China’s Macau revenues. “I didn’t trust anything that came out of Jacobs,” he said. “He tried to go behind my back and report to different members of the board so he wouldn’t have to report to me… I had to repair what he did on the spot. He did things on his own.”
While Michael Leven , the former president and chief operating officer of Las Vegas Sands, testified two weeks ago that Adelson had been concerned that Macau government officials were giving him less favorable treatment than operators based in Macau, Adelson has denied repeatedly that he ordered Jacobs to investigate the financial and business affairs of Macau government officials for potential blackmail opportunities.
On the witness stand, Adelson called Jacobs’ allegations “fabrications” and “delusions,” made in retaliation for the chairman stepping in to correct his subordinate’s mistakes. He also said that although Jacobs “squealed” to the U.S. Securities and Exchanged Commission and U.S. Justice Department alleging illegal activities of LVS in Macau, “after four years of investigating, they haven’t found a shred of evidence yet,” despite open investigations by both agencies.
