PPJ Healthcare Enterprises Inc (PPJE)

[Ed the Trader]

I find this weird. You're just taking Basu's word for a lot of things:

2) Grewal stole intellectual property which belonged to PPJ Enterprise,

You know that how? Because Basu says so?

3) Grewal hired away critical employees away from PPJ Enterprise to start his own competing business in direct violation of his binding non-compete agreement,

He did? And how long did that non-compete agreement last? Grewal claims Basu defrauded him. Would that void a non-compete contract?

4) Grewal defamed PPJ Enterprise by informing all of PPJ's clients that PPJ would steal their money, and whether or not this was true (still putting aside the money issue), Grewal had no right to do this,

Why not? If you have a problem with someone you hire, you're not allowed to tell others about it? Goodbye Angie's List, I guess. Not to mention the Better Business Bureau.

5) Grewal used the fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) that he created in ALL of PPJ Enterprise's clients to steal most of them away for his own newly-formed business, or the FUD drove them away to use a different vendor.

Why give Grewal so much credit? What about Soloniuk? He was ripped off, said so, and a judge agreed with him. Rather vehemently. Basu's been involved in endless litigation, for the most part unsuccessfully. Seems there's a community of opinion.

The total restitution for damages that PPJ Enterprise is requesting in its lawsuit is over 26 million dollars. Even a fraction of that would be a huge deal for a corporation which currently has a market cap of only $894,100.

How much of that would go to PPJE, and how much to Basu, who's clearly stated that she assumed all of Healthcare's legal proceedings? It was, after all, Healthcare that Grewal signed a contract with, not PPJ Enterprise, PBS, or any other current entity.

As you know, I have been critical of many of the things that have been stated in recent PPJ press releases. Most of that criticism has been because either PPJ/Basu made some very stupid statements (ex: the grifter_24 PR) or PPJ/Basu made some statements that defied reasonable creditability (ex: new clients reported at times convenient to PPJ without any verifiable details or audited financials to demonstrate creditability). I am critical of those types of things because they are not things that lead to healthy growth of MY company.

I put a bit more credence in statements that come directly from filed court documents than I do in statements from a press release. Sure, Basu will have prove her side of the story in court, but that also means that the validity of her statements will be tested in the same court. No such validity check happens against a press release.

I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt that someone is more truthful in a complaint document filed with a court. Even given Basu's previous unfortunate issues with providing creditability to courts, I figure that people do learn over time to stop banging their head on the wall when they find that such activities only hurt their head.

===

As for Grewal's non-compete agreement, a person is not relieved of their legal obligations in a contract just because of a disagreement regarding payment. In fact, some of the most important terms of most contracts only kick in AFTER the main part of the business relationship is completed.

Further, it is standard boilerplate for virtually all contracts that if one clause of a contract is found to be invalid by a court, the rest of the contract still continues to be legally binding. So, if Basu did not pay something to Grewal which he was due, Grewal would almost certainly still be held to the terms of his non-compete agreement.

As for how long the non-compete agreement was in effect, although I cannot speak specifically to PPJ's agreement with Grewal, I have signed enough of the things myself to know that most non-compete agreements are for a period of one year AFTER one's services are no longer given to the business. I've seen non-compete agreements even go as long as two years AFTER one is no longer with the business, but one year is pretty standard. A two year agreement may have applied to Grewal because he was a part of senior management, and their non-compete agreements tend to be more stringent than those of mere employees.

===

If you are an employer, and you tell someone outside of the business something derogatory about an employee, you just opened yourself, and the business, wide open to a defamation lawsuit. As such, employers only provide start/end dates of employment, position/title held, and MAYBE pay rate. If someone calls an employer to ask ANY other questions, any smart employer will state that they cannot provide that information. Such a limited response is standard company policy at most businesses.

Angie's List and the Better Business Bureau typically get their information from individuals, and possibly small businesses, who hire contractors and consultants for temporary work. You typically will not find a business filing any reports with Angie or BBB regarding someone, or some other business, with which they have a long-term, ongoing business relationship. It just is not done.

===

Grewal's job as a board member was to protect the shareholders, not the clients. If he found an issue where PPJ (due to Basu) was defrauding the clients, then his responsibility as a board member was to find a way to correct the situation to protect the business, not destroy it but telling all of PPJ's clients that they should move to his competing business. That could even have meant reporting any criminal activity to law enforcement to have Basu removed so the business could survive with out her. PPJ apparently had several employees at the time, so they could have continued to work as someone else could have taken over as CEO.

Sure, Basu has the majority of the stock, so she could replace the board of directors at will. Such is a weakness of small, closely held, corporations.

However, if criminal activity (ie: defrauding clients) was a reality, Basu would only have the choices of accepting a new CEO, or watch her corporation collapse with no management while she was being processed by the justice system.

There is no evidence of Grewal attempting to report any wrongdoing on the part of Basu to law enforcement which is another reason to figure that there was not any.

===

As for the Soloniuk case, certainly past behavior is a strong indicator of present and future behavior. However, it does not automatically make one guilty. That is especially true if the guy working in the next office is a bigger scoundrel than you are!

===

Regarding who gets the results of a judgement, that will likely be for the court to decide because both PPJ and Basu are complainants and cross-defendants. I don't think that, regardless of whatever deal Basu may have stated, that it is possible to buy one's way out of liability. I don't think that a court will accept that PPJ is not responsible for anything that the corporation does even if Basu claims to have been paid to accept that liability. Therefore, I don't think that the reverse concept, that Basu should receive all and any awards, is going to be acceptable to the court either.

That being said, Basu holds a controlling block of PPJ stock so she can largely decide to do whatever she wants. That could include somehow compensating herself with the full amount of any award that PPJ acquires. The lady appears to be 61 years old, so maybe she wants to "cash-out". On the other hand, maybe she wants a chance to prove that she can still make PPJ successful. I don't know enough about the lady's personality and life agenda to know how she likes to spend her time. I do know that she is a control freak and as a fellow control freak, I know that the idea of spending the rest of my days doing nothing but laying on a beach, never doing anything productive, would drive me nuts with boredom. Relaxing on a beach is great for a week or two, but eventually, I am going to want something more engaging of my gray matter.

So, I could be completely wrong, but I am going to side with the idea that Basu likes beaches in small doses as well, and she likes to have something interesting to do, and look forward to doing on all those non-beach days. If that is the case, I expect her to want to put most of her available funding into PPJ to grow the business.