Musk's lawyers say U.S. SEC has not met heavy burden to show contempt

FILE PHOTO: SpaceX founder Elon Musk looks on at a post-launch news conference after the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, carrying the Crew Dragon spacecraft, lifted off on an uncrewed test flight to the International Space Station from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, U.S., March 2, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Blake

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Lawyers for Elon Musk said on Friday that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission had failed to satisfy its heavy burden of showing that the Tesla Inc chief executive should be held in contempt of court.

In a Manhattan federal court filing, Musk’s lawyers also said their client “respects his obligations” to the electric car company, its shareholders and the court.

Musk is trying to avoid being held in contempt for violating his October 2018 fraud settlement with the SEC, for having tweeted on Feb. 19 to his more than 24 million Twitter followers that Tesla could build around 500,000 vehicles in 2019.

Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York, editing by G Crosse

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source: reuters.com