CANTON, Mass. — Viacom Chief Executive Philippe Dauman could be in for a long, hot summer.
After a 2¹/₂-hour hearing on Tuesday, a judge here squashed Dauman’s hopes for a quick resolution to his battle with media mogul Sumner Redstone.
Dauman and fellow Viacom director George Abrams had hoped to persuade the judge to allow an immediate mental evaluation of the ailing 93-year-old Redstone.
The two men are challenging their removals from a family trust and the board of National Amusements Inc., the privately held company that controls Redstone’s $40 billion media empire — chiefly Viacom and CBS.
They sued to reverse their ousters, claiming Redstone lacks the mental capacity to make decisions and is being controlled by his daughter, Shari Redstone.
But Judge George Phelan, sitting in probate court, less than two miles down the road from NAI headquarters, held off ordering a doctor’s evaluation of the mogul, despite Dauman and Abrams’ claims that he is at death’s door.
The judge also tabled a decision on whether the state has jurisdiction. The case that will largely decide the future of both Viacom — parent of MTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and Paramount Pictures — and CBS.
“I’m trying to grasp the idea of billions with a ‘b,’ ” Phelan said.
The judge said the parties should return before the end of June, when he will also hear Sumner Redstone’s lawyers’ motion to dismiss the case.
The longer the case takes, the more precarious Dauman’s position at Viacom becomes. If Redstone is in as bad a condition as Dauman claims, the mogul could die before the Viacom CEO gets to make his case.
In that scenario, Shari Redstone, an outspoken critic of the 62-year-old CEO, takes control of the trust.
“In certain respects, the postponement of its ruling is a partial setback for Mr. Dauman as a critical aspect of his strategy has been to seek to fast track these proceedings, which for now at least, has been somewhat stymied by the court,” said Darren Oved, a New York litigation lawyer not in the case.
The heavyweight legal battle drew 22 lawyers to this sleepy courthouse 20 miles south of downtown Boston.
One lawyer joked it looked like a Massachusetts Bar Association meeting.
“That’s a couple of hundred thousand dollars’ worth of fire power,” another said.
Viacom shares dipped 1.6 percent on Tuesday, to $44.72.
