{"id":205473,"date":"2025-09-23T07:27:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T07:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/205473\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T07:27:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T07:27:11","slug":"owners-of-vancouver-canucks-accused-of-disinheriting-grandson-from-family-trust","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/205473\/","title":{"rendered":"Owners of Vancouver Canucks accused of disinheriting grandson from family trust"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Vancouver Canucks chair Francesco Aquilini speaks during a press conference in January, 2024.Tijana Martin\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

A member of the Aquilini family that owns the Vancouver Canucks NHL team has filed a lawsuit alleging he was disinherited from a family trust and excluded from family business in a \u201cretaliatory\u201d conspiracy over historical allegations of sexual assault against an unnamed family member. <\/p>\n

Matteo Aquilini filed a lawsuit this week in B.C. Supreme Court, naming his grandfather, Luigi Aquilini, and uncles Roberto and Canucks chairman Francesco Aquilini as defendants, both personally and as trustees of the Luigi and Elisa Aquilini Legacy Trust. <\/p>\n

The multibillion-dollar Aquilini Investment Group has numerous holdings that include ownership of the Canucks and Vancouver\u2019s Rogers Arena. <\/p>\n

The notice of civil claim says Matteo is the son of Paolo Aquilini, another son of Luigi and Elisa Aquilini. <\/p>\n

Matteo Aquilini alleges that his grandparents established a trust in 1995 to pass on their wealth to \u201cfuture generations,\u201d and its terms were \u201ccarefully crafted to prevent Luigi from ever benefiting or coming to control the trust property.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawsuit says the legacy trust was set up in 2015, but it was structured in a way that \u201ccontravened\u201d the previous trust and was done under the \u201cguise\u201d of reorganization by Luigi Aquilini, who named himself both a beneficiary and a trustee.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the time, Elisa was gravely ill, and indeed was hospitalized when she was asked to sign critically important documents,\u201d the lawsuit says. <\/p>\n

The defendants have not filed a response to the lawsuit and the Aquilini Investment Group did not immediately respond to an e-mailed request for comment. <\/p>\n

The lawsuit says Elisa\u2019s 2015 death left a \u201cprofound void\u201d that unsettled the balance and unity of the family, which was upended in 2020 when one family member accused another of sexual assault during their childhood. <\/p>\n

The lawsuit, which contains allegations not proven or tested in court, says after Paolo told his father and brothers about the allegations, they \u201cdecided to retaliate against\u201d him to push him out of the family business and disinherit his lineage from the Aquilini Investment Group\u2019s wealth. <\/p>\n

\u201cAfter Elisa passed away, Luigi and his sons Francesco and Roberto wrongfully exercised their control to weaponize the terms of the (trust) and to disinherit the plaintiff and his siblings,\u201d the claim says. <\/p>\n

Matteo Aquilini alleges Francesco and Roberto were appointed as beneficiaries of the trust \u201cunder a veil of secrecy,\u201d and after they became aware of the assault allegations, they and their father \u201ctook retaliatory steps from February 2020 onward to actively exclude Paolo and his children from the family and the family business.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLuigi, Francesco, and Roberto also conspired, as pleaded in detail below, to disinherit Paolo\u2019s lineage entirely from the wealth generated by (Aquilini Investment Group),\u201d the lawsuit says. <\/p>\n

The lawsuit says the family was in a state of \u201cheightened acrimony\u201d in 2022 when another of Paolo\u2019s sons, Christian Aquilini, who has autism, filed a complaint with the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal against his employer, the Vancouver Canucks Limited Partnership. <\/p>\n

\u201cChristian was subjected to a campaign of discrimination, harassment, and bullying by co-workers because of his disability and family status, including negative remarks and a baseless workplace complaint,\u201d the lawsuit says.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit says the complaint is still pending, but Christian Aquilini stopped working due to \u201csevere emotional distress\u201d stemming from alleged threats by his uncles. <\/p>\n

The lawsuit says the trust\u2019s assets are potentially more than $320-million, and Matteo Aquilini seeks damages for breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty, conspiracy and unjust enrichment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Vancouver Canucks chair Francesco Aquilini speaks during a press conference in January, 2024.Tijana…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":205474,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5128],"tags":[1018,1001,1019,967,991,1020,19,990,1008,1009,1004,992,989,894,1014,1016,1013,1007,1000,1030,993,994,1006,5,1002,1003,997,1021,998,1025,1026,4,1028,1023,1027,786,1024,995,1011,1012,333,1010,1022,86,1015,1017,1005,999,893,27,5313,996,1029],"class_list":{"0":"post-205473","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vancouver-canucks","8":"tag-alberta","9":"tag-arts-news","10":"tag-bc","11":"tag-breaking-news","12":"tag-breaking-news-video","13":"tag-british-columbia","14":"tag-canada","15":"tag-canada-news","16":"tag-canada-sports","17":"tag-canada-sports-news","18":"tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","19":"tag-canadian-breaking-news","20":"tag-canadian-news","21":"tag-canucks","22":"tag-economy","23":"tag-education","24":"tag-environment","25":"tag-federal-government","26":"tag-foreign-news","27":"tag-globe-and-mail","28":"tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","29":"tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","30":"tag-government","31":"tag-hockey","32":"tag-life-news","33":"tag-lifestyle","34":"tag-local-news","35":"tag-manitoba","36":"tag-national-news","37":"tag-new-brunswick","38":"tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","39":"tag-nhl","40":"tag-northwest-territories","41":"tag-nova-scotia","42":"tag-nunavut","43":"tag-ontario","44":"tag-pei","45":"tag-photos","46":"tag-political-news","47":"tag-political-opinion","48":"tag-politics","49":"tag-politics-news","50":"tag-quebec","51":"tag-sports-news","52":"tag-technology","53":"tag-travel","54":"tag-trudeau","55":"tag-us-news","56":"tag-vancouver","57":"tag-vancouver-canucks","58":"tag-vancouvercanucks","59":"tag-world-news","60":"tag-yukon"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205473"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205473\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}