Thinkstream CEO Barry Bellue on Tuesday withdrew his appeal to be paid $3,000 a month to assist the company during bankruptcy proceedings after two creditors opposed his request for compensation—one of them with stinging assessments of the embattled executive’s performance.
In a motion filed Tuesday in Baton Rouge federal bankruptcy court, Thinkstream’s largest creditor—TSB Ventures of Folsom—says Bellue’s insistence that he has been working to establish partnerships for a “multimillion-dollar contract with Los Angeles County, Pennsylvania [sic]” is “nothing but nebulous amphigory.”
“The statement is more of the same from Thinkstream, and by extension, Bellue,” writes attorney Erin Wilder-Doomes. “According to Bellue, there is always another multimillion-dollar contract just within reach.”
Noting that the duties Bellue insists he is providing are already being handled at the trustee’s request by his son, Lee Bellue, Wilder-Doomes goes on to critique Barry Bellue’s leadership capabilities in an entire section of her motion entitled “Bellue has historically been Thinkstream’s biggest problem.”
She quotes September testimony from trustee David Rubin that the company had roughly $1,000 in its bank account when he took over in July. The estate also failed to pay its $734,898 in payroll taxes and was $46,000 behind on employee compensation, according to the motion. Wilder-Doomes also reminds the court of Thinkstream’s failure to deposit employee withholdings into 401(k) accounts, resulting in a $25,326 fine and the U.S. Department of Labor permanently barring Bellue from acting as trustee or fiduciary of any other Employee Retirement Income Security Act, or ERISA, plan. She also alleges that while under Bellue’s leadership, Thinkstream repeatedly refused to cooperate in the bankruptcy case.
“With Bellue at the helm, Thinkstream incurred an incredible debt load,” she says. “It is hard to imagine under these circumstances what benefit it can be argued that Bellue brings (or brought) to Thinkstream. … Far from benefiting the estate, Bellue’s actions have continually had deleterious effect on the estate.”
Also opposing Bellue’s compensation was Baton Rouge-based The Rimes Group, which says it is Thinkstream’s eighth-largest shareholder, with 700,000 common shares. Attorney Grey Sexton argues that Bellue’s claim that he is “experiencing severe financial hardship” doesn’t warrant “depleting the estate of [Thinkstream] of substantial assets.”
Thinkstream—a Baton Rouge tech firm that provides software to hundreds of local, state and federal law enforcement agencies in Louisiana and other states—has more than $21.6 million in debt, according to financial statements now on file in bankruptcy court. TSB Ventures is owed nearly $10 million.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Douglas Dodd signed off yesterday on Bellue’s request to withdraw his motion for compensation.
—Penny Font
