Former Kentucky Speedway owners want to continue legal fight
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A former minority owner of Kentucky Speedway is suing the racetrack's one-time majority owner, seeking to have a judge declare he can't drop an antitrust suit in a move that would keep the litigation alive. A group of four trusts operated by Duchossois Group Chairman Richard Duchossois of Illinois filed suit Tuesday against speedway founder Jerry Carroll, saying Carroll doesn't have the legal right to stop an appeal of the suit against NASCAR.
The lawsuit against Carroll, filed in federal court in Covington, comes a day after Duchossois asked the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider it's rejection of the antitrust litigation. The appellate court earlier this month threw out the lawsuit.
Brian Goldwasser of Cincinnati, the attorney for the trusts, did not return a message seeking comment. Carroll declined comment on the lawsuit Tuesday.
The tangled litigation traces back to 2005, when Carroll and the minority owners sued NASCAR and International Speedway Corp., claiming the two companies conspired to monopolize Sprint Cup races and cut the 1.5-mile oval at the Sparta-based Kentucky Speedway out of the loop.
Carroll and his minority partners estimated damages from the suit at between $100 million and $400 million dollars should they win.
A federal judge in Covington dismissed the lawsuit in 2007 and, in December, a three-judge panel from the 6th Circuit followed suit, saying multiple factors likely weigh on NASCAR's decisions about whether to grant Kentucky Speedway or any track a Sprint Cup race.
Carroll, who sold the track to ISC in 2008, said immediately that the decision wouldn't be appealed further, prompting the lawsuit by Duchossois.
In the suit, Duchossois says the operating agreement between Carroll and his partners required approval by 75 percent of the ownership to dispose of any asset -- in this case, the lawsuit. Because the minority partners -- Duchossois and the estate of Jerry Lindahl -- owned more than 40 percent of the race track and voted against dropping the suit, Carroll had no authority to end the litigation, Duchossois said in the suit.
In the rehearing petition filed with the appeals court, the race track says a rehearing is necessary because, "the panel's decision conflicts with established antitrust law in four fundamental respects." It also claims the panel made other, "fundamental legal errors of antitrust analysis."
The track, about halfway between Louisville and Cincinnati, has drawn huge crowds to some of its other races. The NASCAR Nationwide series race last year drew more than 70,000 people.
The speedway's former owners claim NASCAR had conspired to leave the Sparta track and others out of the Sprint Cup -- formerly known as the Nextel Cup -- series despite their superior amenities. The speedway had asked that ISC be ordered to sell some of the tracks it owns that host Sprint Cup races and that the speedway be awarded more than $200 million in damages.
ISC-owned tracks host 55 percent of all Sprint Cup races. The rest are facilities owned by other companies, including Speedway Motorsports Inc., the only company besides ISC that hosts more than one Sprint Cup race.
Attorneys for NASCAR and ISC argued that the speedway had insufficient evidence to prove NASCAR and ISC worked together with other tracks to keep the Kentucky track from obtaining a race in the Sprint Cup series.
Kentucky Speedway has taken several steps to lure a Sprint Cup race, including getting an interstate highway widened near the track and adding a new exit. The track, with a capacity of just over 66,000 fans, has said it's prepared to add 20,000 to 35,000 seats if it attracted a Sprint Cup race.
