Pocklington’s bid to cut deal foiled
Former Oilers owner owes creditors, including province, over $21.5 million
An Alberta judge has blocked an attempt by former Edmonton Oilers owner Peter Pocklington to cut a deal on the millions of dollars in debt he owes the province and other creditors.
Pocklington, who moved to the United States after selling the team in the 1990s, owes creditors over $21.5 million. About $13.5 million is owed to the Province of Alberta.
Pocklington’s financial dispute with the province began in the 1980s when he defaulted on a contract governing a $67-million bailout of several of his Alberta companies, according to a ruling filed Monday with the Court of Queen’s Bench.
In a notice of intention to make a proposal filed in Edmonton court in spring 2017, Pocklington sought to offer creditors $5.6 million that would be funded by an undisclosed third party, and paid out over five years. In exchange, Alberta and the other U.S.-based creditors would release all claims on Pocklington, his wife and family.
But the province argued Pocklington’s proposal was “a patently obvious ploy to thwart efforts to collect on its judgments, both being enforceable in Alberta and California,” according to Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Juliana Topolniski’s written ruling.
The province has already obtained two judgments in its favour in the dispute, and in 2016 also launched an action against Pocklington in a California court.
In her decision, Topolniski found Pocklington is not an insolvent person under the federal Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, and so is in no position to make the proposal to creditors.
The judgment is just the latest in a series of legal twists related to Pocklington’s financial troubles.
He filed for voluntary bankruptcy in California in 2008, but the filing failed.
In 2009, he was arrested in the U.S. for bankruptcy fraud, and later sentenced to home detention and probation after pleading guilty to perjury.
According to Topolniski’s decision, Pocklington described himself to the court as a 75-year-old “consultant” who lives in Palm Desert, Calif.
He claims an annual income of $25,000, plus CPP benefits, and to have $6,300 worth of sports equipment and personal effects in California.
Pocklington left a mixed legacy in Edmonton when, awash in debt, he sold the Oilers in 1998. Though he signed hockey phenomenon Wayne Gretzky, and was at the wheel during the team’s glory years, he was later vilified for trading Gretzky in 1988.
Still, when he returned to the city for a 2014 anniversary celebration of the Oilers’ 1984 Stanley Cup win, the crowd at Rexall Place gave him a standing ovation.