by Travis Mateer
The local reporting about the busted sale of Marshall Mountain is leaving me confused.
I actually had to check my sources to make sure I didn’t hallucinate Rick Wishcamper was involved, or that some kind of Mandela effect might be screwing with me, especially considering I referenced the OTHER person now being discussed in relation to what went wrong with the sale of Marshall Mountain in this post.
Now, in an amended filing to the Missouri couple’s lawsuit, the name being reported as offering a cash backup offer is none other than Nick Checota. From the first link:
The amended complaint states that Nick Checota, a Missoula entertainment promoter, had submitted a backup offer “for a higher price than the purchase price specified in the agreement between the Doerings and Melbys.”
The recreational community, including Mountain Bike Missoula, held out hope that the Doerings would accept Checota’s backup offer, suggesting that Checota, who hadn’t been identified as the second potential buyer at the time, intended to place the property in the public domain to maintain its current public access.
So the Doerings, who no one in Missoula is supposed to feel sorry for, got the Nick/Rick combo punch. And it will be the Doerings who will be depicted as the outsiders, while the Wisconsin/Maine transplants who share having a rich Daddy named Joe will be depicted as “a Missoula entertainment promoter” and a “longtime Missoula developer”, respectively.
I know I’m not supposed to feel sorry for the Doerings, but the details of how this blew up in their face is actually pretty terrible, considering how far along they had gotten in their relocation. And I’m not just talking about putting their house on the market. No, the house is sold and the moving van was on its way:
According to the complaint, the original contract had gone so far that the Melbys’ were already heading to Missoula. Their household possessions were also heading to Missoula with a moving company.
Mr. Melby also had quit his job in St. Louis and was preparing for his new job at Providence.
“The Melbys — including their children — were caught by surprise while in the midst of a cross-country move, without the ability to go back to the life they had left in Missouri or move forward and pursue the life they were set to establish in Montana,” the complaint contends.
That’s all pretty terrible, but when two dudes with names that rhyme with DICK bring the combined power their JoeDad Derivative Swap origins, well, what’s a SHOW-ME STATE couple to do?
Litigate in court for damages, of course.
I just hope Nick is keeping that Covid relief cash in a separate account.