Turn out the lights, the party's over...

No, it's not quite that bad for the Rochester Knighthawks, but the celebration of their first league championship in ten years came to a crashing halt Friday when minority owner Randall Latona sued fellow owners Steve Donner and Walter Turek.

Latona alleges that Donner has mismanaged the Knighthawks and the American Hockey League's Rochester Americans, including putting the hockey team hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and temporarily costing the Knighthawks voting power in NLL matters by falling $20,000 behind in league dues.

The suit, filed in New York Supreme Court, alleges that Turek has improperly agreed to vote with Donner on all matters involving the teams, essentially giving Donner unchecked authority over the teams.

In the lawsuit, Latona asks that Donner be removed as chief executive officer of the Americans and Knighthawks and that he be ordered to repay Latona for any improper expenditures.

In late 2005, according to Latona's complaint, he and Turek assembled a $2.1 million (US) financing package for the Americans and Knighthawks, to relieve existing debt and provide additional operating capital.

As part of the deal, Latona was named chief financial officer of the two teams and was given direct access to the teams' finances and greater input into future financial activity.

Instead, Latona alleges, Donner denied him the right to participate in financial decisions, by refusing requests for check registers and accounts payable information, by asking creditors not to disclose financial information to Latona, and by obstructing an independent review of the two teams' finances.

The suit contains a laundry list of allegations against Donner, including:

• Incurring $83,264 in debt to The Hockey Company, a subsidiary of the hockey equipment manufacturer CCM, for equipment for the Americans. Of this amount, over $23,000 dates to the 2005-2006 season.
• Causing The Hockey Company to refuse to supply equipment due to non-payment.
• Failing to make payments on the debt to The Hockey Company after Latona arranged a payment plan to eliminate the debt.
• Owing $13,996 in payments to the AHL's player health and welfare trust fund.
• Incurring $79,137 in debt to the AHL, for which the league threatened charges under its constitution, up to "involuntary suspension or termination."
• Causing the AHL to suspend the Americans' voting rights on league matters.
• Incurring approximately $20,000 in debt to the NLL for unspecified expenses.
• Causing the NLL to suspend the Knighthawks' voting rights on league matters.
• Incurring $85,000 in debt to the National Hockey League's Buffalo Sabres and an undisclosed amount to the NHL's Florida Panthers for unpaid player development fees.
• Unilaterally announcing this spring that the Americans and Knighthawks would suspend operations, fold or relocate unless a more favorable lease could be negotiated.
• Unilaterally loaning $100,000, interest-free and for a period of one year, from the Americans and/or Knighthawks to the Rochester Raging Rhinos professional soccer team because the Rhinos were short on operating capital. Donner is the principal owner of the Rhinos; Latona has no interest in the team.
• Causing the Blue Cross Arena to withhold gate receipts from playoff games to cover rent arrearages.
• Failing to inform Latona that Blue Cross Arena was unavailable for the 2007 NLL Championship Game or of efforts to remedy the problem. The Knighthawks forfeited home-floor advantage as a result and the game was played at Glendale Arena in Arizona, home arena of the opposing Arizona Sting.

Reached for comment by the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Donner admitted that his relationship with Latona has become strained.

"We have not had a positive relationship and have been looking for an amicable end," Donner said. "Obviously we haven't found it."

Donner went on to explain that the Americans' voting rights will be restored this summer after the AHL withholds the remaining money owed from the team's cut of annual leaguewide profits.

Donner also claimed that the Americans actually owed less than $30,000 to the Sabres -- not the $85,000 Latona claims -- and that the debt has been settled.

On the subject of the relocated NLL Championship Game, Donner reminded the newspaper reporter that he petitioned the NLL Board of Governors to move the game to Buffalo or Toronto but that the board refused.

"I think that alone gives you basis for everything else [in the lawsuit]," Donner said.