Just out of bankruptcy, Tribune Co. intends to drop the bulk of some 170 lawsuits that targeted senior media executives who cashed in on the going-private deal that ruined the company's finances, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported yesterday. The in-court announcement on Wednesday came as Tribune moved to take control of part of the flood of litigation touched off by its 2008 collapse into chapter 11, which happened less than a year after a leveraged buyout. Lawsuits will continue against upper-echelon executives such as former Chief Executive Dennis FitzSimons, who pocketed $47 million out of the deal, court papers say. Tribune's chapter 11 plan divided the litigation spoils of the failed LBO, giving creditors the right to chase the big-ticket causes of action against top-ranking insiders involved in the 2007 LBO. Most of that action is in a New York court, with creditors relying on the findings of a bankruptcy probe that found the taint of fraud on part of the LBO.
