How a Private Equity Firm’s Corporate Maze Kept It Out of Reach of the Consumers It Allegedly Defrauded

The Non-Financial Ledger

Three Michigan families, Aaron Hall, Katherine Glod, and Jeffrey Binder, each handed over more than $30,000 for a promise that clean energy would lower their electric bills. Instead of the 70 to 90 percent reduction they say they were sold, their complaint states the bills stayed roughly the same or, in some cases, went up.

They filed suit within a month of Power Home Solar’s collapse. Four years later, they still have not had a court hear whether they were defrauded. Instead, they have spent that time fighting over which state’s courthouse gets to hear the case at all.

A federal appeals court has now ruled that even though every dollar of alleged harm happened in Michigan, the private equity fund they say helped write the advertising that misled them cannot be forced to answer for it in a Michigan courtroom.

Legal Receipts

“[Homeowners could] save thousands on their electric bills” and “get paid $2,000 after install.” Amended Complaint, R. 96 ¶¶ 92, 98, 99, as cited by the Sixth Circuit

• This is the core sales pitch the company and its investors are alleged to have mailed, posted online, and used in in-home presentations across Michigan.
• The court records these as specific, quantified financial promises, not vague marketing language, which is central to the plaintiffs’ fraud theory.

The defendants “committed countless acts of mail and wire fraud.” Amended Complaint ¶ 92, as cited by the Sixth Circuit

• This is the plaintiffs’ formal allegation underlying their civil RICO racketeering claim, the same category of law written to dismantle organized crime.
• The court accepted this allegation as true only for purposes of deciding the jurisdictional question on appeal; it is not a finding that fraud occurred.

The company disseminated “false, misleading, and fraudulent advertisements.” Amended Complaint ¶ 92, as cited by the Sixth Circuit

• This allegation directly ties the advertising materials, which Trivest is accused of helping prepare, to the fraud claim itself.

Electricity bills “had not been reduced in any amount near 70-90%.” Amended Complaint ¶ 114, as cited by the Sixth Circuit

• This is the plaintiffs’ direct rebuttal to the company’s central sales promise, and the court notes their bills “in some instances had even increased.”
• This is the specific factual gap between promise and outcome that the entire lawsuit is built on.

Public Deception

The company’s central marketing claim and the plaintiffs’ account of what actually happened to their bills sit directly next to each other in the court record.

• Power Home Solar’s advertising promised systems would cut electric bills by up to 90% and let homeowners “save thousands.” The plaintiffs allege their bills were never reduced anywhere near that range, and in some cases increased instead.

The Contractor Shield

Nine separate Trivest entities ended up as defendants in this case, and that structure is a large part of why the Sixth Circuit ruled Michigan has no power to hear the claims against them.

• Trivest Partners, L.P. did not invest directly in Power Home Solar. It used a subsidiary, TGIF (formerly Trivest) Power Home Investor, L.L.C., to acquire the 25% stake in 2018, placing a layer between the parent fund and the company accused of fraud.
• As litigation proceeded, the plaintiffs had to add seven more Trivest entities, Trivest Investment Advisors LLC, Trivest Partners Inc, Trivest Growth Partners Inc, Trivest Growth Partners LP, Trivest Growth Partners GP LLC, Trivest Growth Investment Fund LP, and TGIF Power Home Blocker Inc, as co-defendants.
• Every one of the nine Trivest entities is a Florida citizen with, in the court’s own words, “zero contacts with Michigan,” even though the advertising they allegedly helped prepare targeted Michigan homeowners directly.
• Because personal jurisdiction is decided entity by entity, the same layered structure that let Trivest participate in the business also gave each entity separate legal cover to argue it never touched Michigan.

Societal Impact Mapping

Economic Inequality

• Each plaintiff paid more than $30,000, a sum that for a working Michigan household is often a significant share of a year’s income, on the promise the system would pay for itself in electric bill savings.
• Instead of savings, the complaint alleges bills “in some instances had even increased,” turning what was pitched as an investment into an added monthly cost stacked on top of a five-figure debt.
• The company that sold the systems collapsed into bankruptcy in 2022, leaving customers with limited practical ability to recover money directly from Power Home Solar itself.
• The entity plaintiffs allege helped fund and advertise the scheme, Trivest Partners, has now won a ruling keeping it out of the Michigan court where its alleged victims live.

This Is the System Working as Intended

A federal appeals court just ruled that a statute Congress wrote to make sure organized-crime defendants couldn’t hide from prosecution now works to keep a private equity investor out of the court closest to its alleged victims.

• The dissent notes the Trivest entities retained “competent counsel” in Michigan and litigated there for years without objection, yet the majority still found no hardship significant enough to keep the case in that court.
• The ruling means three Michigan homeowners must either restart their case against Trivest in Florida, a state with no documented connection to their alleged harm, or continue only against the founder, Waller, in Michigan.
• The outcome hinged on one interpretive dispute over the word “require” in a 1970 statute, a dispute significant enough to produce a full formal dissent, showing how legal recourse for defrauded consumers can turn on statutory word choice rather than the underlying facts of the fraud.

What a Legitimate Fix Looks Like

This case exposes a structural gap: a private equity fund can help fund and advertise a consumer product, then use a multi-entity structure to avoid ever being sued in the state where the people it advertised to were harmed.

What Now?

The case now returns to the Eastern District of Michigan (No. 4:22-cv-12743), where Trivest’s nine entities are dismissed and the founder, Jayson Waller, remains a defendant.

• Watchlist: the Federal Trade Commission, which handles deceptive advertising claims in the home solar sales industry.
• Watchlist: the Michigan Attorney General’s Office, which enforces the Michigan Consumer Protection Act the plaintiffs also invoked.
• Track the docket at the Eastern District of Michigan, No. 4:22-cv-12743, to see whether the plaintiffs pursue Trivest separately in Florida.
• If you signed a home solar contract under similar bill-reduction promises, request the full ownership and investor structure behind your installer before signing anything further, and keep every piece of advertising you were shown.
• Connect with a consumer protection legal aid clinic if you believe you were sold a home solar system on promises that did not materialize.