Eddie Lampert Owes $18 Million After Novel Sears Hometown Ruling

Eddie Lampert must pay $18.3 million to former shareholders in Sears Hometown and Outlet Stores Inc., a bankrupt onetime affiliate of the iconic department store chain that the billionaire took private in 2019, a Delaware judge said in a novel decision Wednesday.

The case stemmed from the decline of Sears Hometown, which spun off from Sears Holding Corp.—Sears, Roebuck & Co.'s former parent—in 2012. The lawsuit challenged Lampert’s buyout for $2.25 a share in a transaction that also handed minority investors $0.96 a share from the separate sale of the company’s most profitable segment.

Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster’s ...