Excerpt from the Dayton Daily News
The Ohio Court of Claims found in favor of Wright State University in a former consultant’s lawsuit against the university, ruling that the lack of a written contract failed to bolster the consultant’s arguments that Wright State owed him millions of dollars.
“At trial, plaintiff Ron Wine Consulting Group, LLC failed to produce a written agreement between itself and defendant WSU (Wright State University) that memorializes that defendant WSU agreed to compensation that included a 5% performance-based incentive” to Wine, the court wrote.
The contract, and whether it stipulated that Wine was to receive 5% of new revenues he helped Wright State achieve, was the “pertinent issue,” the Ohio Court of Claims ruled.
Wine did not prove his civil claims “by the requisite degree of proof,” the court ruled last month. “The court further holds that defendant WSU (Wright State University) is entitled to a judgment in its favor.”
The Dayton Daily News previously reported that former Wright State consultant Ron Wine allegedly had what one former WSU administrator called a “handshake agreement” with WSU’s president at the time to pay Wine millions in performance bonuses for securing state and federal research contracts for the university, according to depositions in Wine’s lawsuit, a suit that sought $4.5 million from the school.
The depositions raised questions about how vigilant university representatives were in overseeing the payment arrangement between Wine and the school at a time when Wright State was facing distinct financial challenges.
