The Greenbrier resort, owned by governor and Republican U.S. Senate nominee Jim Justice and his family under the title of Greenbrier Hotel Corp., is apparently off the auction block. It’s great news for employees, resort goers and West Virginians as a whole. The iconic resort was set to be auctioned off in August and then later this month following defaulted loan payments — a trend in Justice’s business dealings.
But Justice reported this week all was squared away concerning the default on a $142 million promissory note issued in 2014, now held by Beltway Capital, which was apparently satisfied with an agreement this week to receive more than $22 million.
Justice credited divine intervention in saving the resort from an auction on the courthouse steps.
“So many times in life, God always shows up. He’s in our lives everywhere, and he always shows up,” Justice said during a briefing, as reported by West Virginia MetroNews. “If you just look around, you can see him at work all the time.”
God doesn’t come up a lot in multi-million dollar business disputes that don’t involve televangelists. And while Justice is free to believe his faith benefits him, the almighty isn’t really known for depositing random piles of cash out of thin air, either.
It seems more likely Justice found yet another escape hatch from one of the few banks or investment groups still willing to do business with him outside of a courtroom.
MetroNews reported an amended deed for the resort shows a limited partner investment group — CF Green Investors — as the lender in settling the dispute with Beltway Capital. The group was incorporated in Delaware last month and has the same address as the New York office of equity firm Fortress Investment Group.
The specifics of the arrangement between the Justice family and Fortress Investment aren’t known, and, as the Gazette-Mail reported, Justice claimed he couldn’t disclose any of those details. If Justice is under a legal obligation of non-disclosure, it’s certainly novel to see him adhering to something that would go against him in court.
Just who bailed Justice out, why and how are important questions as he’s on the cusp of becoming a U.S. senator. Those answers might be hard to find. Outside of the oiliness of Justice’s business practices, it’s an assumed good thing that The Greenbrier resort didn’t get auctioned off to a potential devil West Virginians don’t know.
