Elon Musk subpoenaed Stanford, which he attended for 2 days back in 1995 before dropping out, over an 'email account,' according to his lawyer
- Elon Musk's legal team subpoenaed Stanford University on Wednesday in its Twitter court battle.
- Musk's attorney said the legal team was requesting "information regarding an email account."
Elon Musk's legal team subpoenaed Stanford University on Wednesday as the Tesla CEO prepares to battle Twitter in court later this year.
Alex Spiro, Musk's attorney, told Insider the legal team was requesting "information regarding an email account" because "Twitter is hiding stuff." He said the "issue was resolved and is done with."
Twitter is suing Musk to force him to buy the company for $44 billion after attempting to walk away from the purchase in July. Musk has since countersued the company.
Spokespeople for Twitter and Stanford University did not respond to a request for comment ahead of publication.
Musk's legal request includes any documents or communications regarding the purchase between Twitter, Stanford, and anyone involved with the university from January 1, 2019 to present.
Stanford University is known for producing some of Silicon Valley's top executives. Stanford University has some ties to Twitter. The social media company's CEO, Parag Agrawal, received a doctorate in computer science from the institution and a Twitter board member is a professor at the school.
While it's unclear what Musk's legal team hopes to gain from its most recent subpoena, the request could be seeking out any communication conducted about the deal on a Stanford email account, if, for example, its CEO or another executive still use their university email.
Even Musk also has ties to the institution. In 1995, he enrolled in a doctorate physics program at the school, but dropped out after two days.
Earlier this month, the billionaire posted a picture of a letter from a professor at the school who had recently reached out to him to congratulate him on his work on EV batteries and spotlight some of the material he would have studied at the university. The professor told the school paper he has "no involvement" in the court case.
"As far as I know, neither does Stanford," Professor William Nix told The Stanford Daily.
The subpoena is one of a slew of legal requests that have been issued over the past month. Earlier this week, The New York Times reported that both sides have issued over 100 subpoenas to Silicon Valley's elite, from Jack Dorsey to Larry Ellison and Marc Andreessen.
Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan's Ross Business School, told Insider the request is just another example of Musk "fishing through haystacks looking for needles."
"He wants to make litigation as expensive and embarrassing to Twitter as he can, in the hope that Twitter will settle so he won't face the risk of buying the company at the full price he agreed to pay," Gordon said.
Experts previously told Insider that despite the ironclad purchase agreement Twitter faces an expensive court battle.
Most recently, Musk's legal team is attempting to amend its initial counterclaims against Twitter's lawsuit and delay the trial. The social media company says it plans to force Musk to go through with the $44 billion purchase, and Musk is arguing Twitter intentionally misled him about the number of daily users and spam accounts on its site. Now, Musk wants to include additional claims from an explosive whistleblower complaint in his argument.