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Milton “engaged in a deceitful plan to trick retail investors” for his own individual advantage, according to the federal indictment unsealed by U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan on Thursday. Milton was charged with 2 counts of securities fraud and wire fraud by a federal grand jury.

The charges reflect a quick and furious run for Nikola and Milton, who founded the business in 2015. Milton often posted on Twitter directing his message to retail investors after the company went public that summer. Trevor Milton resigned from Nikola on September 20, 2020 and has not been involved in the company’s operations or communications since that time.

Particularly, district attorneys detailed in the problem how Milton utilized social media and frequent looks on television in a PR blitz that flooded “the market with false and misleading details about Nikola” before the company even produced a product.

Trevor Milton, the fast-talking showman creator of Nikola and the electrical truck start-up’s former CEO and executive chairman, has actually been charged with three counts of fraud.

Trevor Milton resigned from Nikola on September 20, 2020 and has not been involved in the company’s operations or interactions since that time. Today’s federal government actions are versus Mr. Milton separately, and not against the company. Nikola has cooperated with the government throughout the course of its inquiry. We stay dedicated to our formerly revealed timelines and milestones and are concentrated on providing Nikola Tre battery-electric trucks later this year from the company’s manufacturing centers.

The charges show a fast and furious run for Nikola and Milton, who established the company in 2015. Milton got more attention after unveiling the first prototype and boasted that the business would produce “the iPhone of trucking.” Guarantees around other items including an electric pickup called Badger would quickly follow as well as strategies to develop a factory in Arizona.

In March 2020, the business announced it would go public by means of a merger with unique function acquisition business VectoIQ Acquisition Corp. Milton frequently published on Twitter directing his message to retail investors after the business went public that summertime. In September and just days after GM had announced a $2 billion investment in the company, kept in mind short-seller Hindenburg Research implicated Nikola of fraud. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission opened a questions in the matter and within two weeks Milton had stepped downas executive chairman.