Bankrupt Aquatic Parks Selling Dolphins Amid Fight With Ex-CEO

(Bloomberg) — U.S. advisers are liquidating Mexican aquatic theme park operator The Dolphin Company, which has asked a judge in Delaware for permission to sell some of the parks and their animals, despite an ongoing fight over whether the company’s former CEO was wrongly ousted.

The company, which filed for bankruptcy last year after lenders ousted its longtime CEO, plans to sell 87 dolphins and other marine mammals as well as parks in Cancun, Mexico. The Mexico-based company has already sold parks in the US and Europe under the supervision of a US court.

Mexican parks are at the center of a long-running battle between lenders and former CEO Eduardo Albor. A U.S. judge fined Albor $10,000 a day for allegedly interfering with park operations by withdrawing cash from ticket sales and misrepresenting himself in Mexican court cases.

Rodrigo Constandse Córdova, chief executive of rival park owner Delphinus, signed an agreement to pay $20 million for the resorts, according to court documents filed Friday. The proposed transaction also includes 87 bottlenose dolphins, six sea lions and eight manatees, according to court documents.

The U.S. judge overseeing the liquidation of Dolphin Company must approve the sale to Delphinus Blue Planet before it can close.

Before that, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber is likely to rule on Silverstein’s request to dismiss Albor’s bankruptcy case, which would clear the way for Albor’s return.

Albor said last week that Mexico’s Supreme Court backed him in a recent ruling and that lenders should never have removed him. It argued in U.S. court papers that it obtained a favorable ruling through a special Mexican appeals process designed to review court decisions regarding violations of the country’s constitution.

Albor claimed in a bankruptcy filing filed last month that the decision meant that all previous court rulings in favor of the lenders or American advisors and any actions they had taken must be set aside. Lenders and American advisers dispute Albor’s claims about the Supreme Court and the special appeals process known in Mexico as amparo. In their appeal, they told the U.S. bankruptcy judge that Albor had repeatedly lost cases in Mexico.

The former CEO also faces accusations that he threatened an opposing lawyer and withheld information that could have prevented the death of a dolphin.

In a series of text messages sent in March, Albor called the American advisers’ lawyer a “pig,” a “castrated dog” and a “third-rate gangster.” Albor, a corporate lawyer-turned-entrepreneur, sent the message in Spanish days after his release from a Mexico City prison earlier this year. He had been detained for a week after failing to appear in criminal proceedings related to a dispute with lenders and the company’s restructuring advisers.

American advisers who have controlled Dolphin Company since Albor was ousted last year say Albor’s WhatsApp messages are part of a pattern of abusive and abusive behavior that has cost the company at least $4 million and interfered with its efforts to sell its assets.

Albor testified last week in federal court in Wilmington, Delaware, arguing that his suspension from the company by accepting the text messages was legally flawed.

Albor blamed the Covid-19 pandemic for the park operator’s financial difficulties and stated that the safety of animals and visitors was his top priority. In court documents, accusations regarding the welfare of the dolphins were made against Dolphin Co. He said his advisers intended to distract from his legal argument that he lacked corporate authority to file the Chapter 11 case.

The former CEO was arrested earlier this year at a restaurant in Cancun, where he and American advisers were battling for control of a valuable dolphin-themed water park. He was later flown to Mexico City to appear in criminal court and sentenced to several days in jail, a filing by the company’s lenders said.

The case is Leisure Investments Holdings LLC, case number 25-10606, in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.

–With help from Jonathan Randles.

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