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A Wasco County jury on Thursday found for Copa di Vino founder and Sunshine Mill winery owner James Martin and awarded damages totaling $23.4 million in his lawsuit against vineyard-development collaborator John Babikian.
With the verdict, Martin will be able to take possession of a disputed 400-acre Dalles-area property with a 110-acre vineyard, which Babikian had moved to seize in 2021.
The 12-person jury deliberated for about three hours after a seven-day trial. At least nine were convinced of Martin's claims that he and Babikian had a partnership and Babikian failed to follow through on an obligation to fund the vineyard.
Moreover, the jurors agreed that Babikian tried to gain control of the vineyard through conspiratorial deceit and coercion — including making what Martin viewed as threats against his family — a finding that added racketeering damages to the toll.
The jury assessed economic damages for lost profits and punitive damages in several categories that added up to $23.4 million by Martin's lawyers' math. Martin was also awarded attorney fees.
A bench trial in December is set to determine the value of Martin's and Babikian's respective 50% stakes in the vineyard. The damages will be more than sufficient to offset Babikian's equity, Martin's lawyer Chad Colton said, allowing Martin to get out of the partnership and assume ownership of the vineyard.
To win his case, Martin overcame a lack of written documentation of a partnership. That absence was a key plank in the ultimately unsuccessful defense mounted by Babikian's legal team.
The case pitted two men who had brushes with forms of celebrity in the early 2010s — Martin as a contestant on the reality-TV show "Shark Tank" and Babikian as an accused penny-stock fraudster.
Babikian in 2014 paid $3.7 million to settle civil pump-and-dump charges with securities regulators. After reportedly going on the run in 2013 he gained the media moniker "The Wolf of Montreal."
Martin's legal team, from the Portland firm Markowitz Herbold, used a former FBI agent expert witness to undergird their case with the claim that Babikian secretly used Martin as a mark for laundering his ill-gotten gains.
Editor's note: This story has been updated to clarify that the verdict did not award Martin full possession of the disputed vineyard, but will allow him to take sole ownership when the case is completed.