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The
ruling came after U.S. District Judge Edgardo Ramos also
rejected Milton's motions to dismiss an indictment accusing the
former billionaire of lying to investors about the electric- and
hydrogen-powered automaker's progress in developing its
technology starting in 2019.
Milton, 40, has pleaded not guilty. Jury selection is expected
to begin on Monday for his trial, which is expected to last five
weeks.
Prosecutors said Milton's misleading statements included
assertions that Nikola had early success in creating a "Nikola
One" semi-truck prototype he knew did not work.
Audrey Strauss, the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan at the
time of Milton's July 2021 arrest, had said the closest the
Nikola One ever came to driving was when engineers rolled a
prototype down a hill so it could be filmed for a commercial.
Milton's lawyer Bradley Bondi had sought to have the 2017 video
excluded from the trial, saying it was filmed before the alleged
wrongdoing described in the indictment, and that Milton had
acknowledged the truck had not operated under its own power.
"They want to bring it in because they want to inflame the
jury," Bondi told the judge, calling the video a "sideshow
circus."
Ramos sided with prosecutors, calling the video "direct
evidence" of the charges against Milton.
Nikola has said an outside party shot the video for a
commercial, and the truck was never described as "under its own
propulsion."
Last December, Nikola agreed to pay $125 million to settle U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission civil charges that it misled
investors about its technology and prospects. It did not admit
or deny wrongdoing.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; editing by Diane Craft)
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