An appeals court has reinstated a host of civil claims against Denver developer Brian Watson, overturning a lower-court ruling that had been favorable to him.
The decision by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals means Watson, the owner and CEO of Northstar Commercial Partners, again must defend himself from claims made by Seattle-based Amazon that he committed fraud and racketeering in connection with the development of data centers for the tech giant in northern Virginia.
The appeals court determined that “genuine disputes of material fact” remain on those claims.
The decision means a court battle that began in April 2020, and which once featured a parallel criminal investigation that federal prosecutors abandoned in unusual fashion, will continue.
“It’s a disappointment — I don’t know that it’s a surprise,” said Stan Garnett, Watson’s attorney.
“Regardless, our job will be to get it to trial as quickly as possible and win it for Brian,” he added.
The case revolves around millions of dollars that Watson’s firm paid to a trust, money which was later shared with Carl Nelson and Casey Kirschner, two employees that worked on real estate for Amazon. The two men are also defendants in the case.
Amazon has described those payments as kickbacks paid for Nelson and Kirschner steering contracts to Amazon.
Watson has said payments to the trust, set up by Casey’s brother Christian, were legitimate referral fees that compensated Christian for introducing Watson to Amazon and helping Northstar land business. Watson did not direct or intend for a portion of those fees to be passed on to Casey Kirschner or Carl Nelson, he has said.
Watson has denied knowing that the men were given money by the trust, which was set up by Casey Kirschner’s brother Christian, a longtime friend of Watson. Watson says he paid the trust “referral fees” he owed Christian for introducing him to Amazon and landing work.
Nelson and Kirschner have argued that Watson landed contracts through a competitive process, that they did not make the final call on Amazon’s real estate decisions and that getting money from the trust did not violate their Amazon employment contract.
The appeals court decision this week means Amazon’s lawsuit will proceed in federal district court in Virginia, where a judge’s April 2023 decision allowed only two of Amazon’s claims against Watson to proceed. The case has been on pause for approximately two years amid the appeal.
The appeals court also reopened Amazon’s one claim against Rod Atherton, a local attorney who helped create the shell companies that the payments were funneled through.
In the interim, Watson has been going on the offensive. In September 2024, he sued a former Northstar employee whose email to founder Jeff Bezos initiated Amazon’s investigation. In October 2024, he sued IPI Partners, a firm that helped finance the data center deals. And last December, he sued Amazon itself in federal court in Colorado.
In a statement, Alex Little, an attorney for Nelson, called the appeals court decision “disappointing.” He noted that the lower court’s ruling was followed in short order by the Justice Department vacating guilty pleas it had secured in a related criminal investigation from Christian Kirschner and former Northstar executive Kyle Ramstetter.
“Amazon had repeatedly trumpeted that criminal investigation to support its baseless civil case,” Little said.
Last year, Ramstetter told Nelson’s wife Amy in a recorded phone call that he was “being threatened with f***ing everything” during the investigation. Ramstetter said Nelson “did nothing wrong,” reversing what he’d told the court.
“We will petition for an evidentiary hearing so these matters can be investigated. One man against a trillion-dollar corporation is daunting, but Mr. Nelson has stood his ground for years, and we are confident the truth will prevail,” Little said Tuesday.
Amazon spokeswoman Montana MacLachlan said the company was “pleased” with the decision and looks “forward to the opportunity to present the extensive evidence of the defendants’ misconduct.”
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