Chad Taylor settles defamation suit filed by Bill Hynes, York Daily Record Options

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https://www.ydr.com/story/news/local/2025/0...it/83043857007/

Live guitarist Chad Taylor settles defamation suit filed by Bill Hynes

Mike Argento
York Daily Record
Published April 11, 2025

In February 2023, Rolling Stone magazine published a lengthy autopsy of the '90s alt-rock band Live, focusing on the band's disintegration and descent into a seemingly endless morass of lawsuits and recriminations.

In the article, Live guitarist Chad Taylor placed a lot of the blame for the band's downfall, and the collapse of the band members' foray into developing a high-speed fiber optic network and redeveloping a blighted area in York's north end, on Bill Hynes.

Hynes had served as a CEO of the band's business venture, United Fiber & Data, and in the interview, Taylor accused Hynes of various nefarious acts, describing him as a con artist who stole millions of dollars from him, leaving him practically broke. The headline on the article was "How an Alleged Con Man Tore Apart One of the Nineties’ Biggest Bands."



Hynes vehemently disputed Taylor's accusations, and a month after the article was published he filed a defamation suit against the guitarist, claiming that Taylor knew the statements to be false “or alternatively, acted with reckless disregard for their truth or falsity.” Hynes asserted in the suit, “There is absolutely no documentary or other evidence supporting the false allegations of (Taylor), because it is pure malicious fantasy."

As the lawsuit worked its way through the court system, Taylor provided a sworn affidavit "to correct and clarify certain statements I made in the Rolling Stone's interview."

He wrote, "Many of the implications and quotations contained in this article were based on my limited knowledge at that time, and I have subsequently learned through discovery that many of my impressions were not complete."

In 2023, state police filed charges alleging that Hynes had stolen nearly $4.4 million from United Fiber & Data and associated businesses during his tenure as CEO. Hynes has asserted that he is innocent of the charges.

In his affidavit, Taylor says that principles and investors in the business were aware of and supported Hynes' activities running the various companies.

Taylor wrote, "Over the years of our partnership, Mr. Hynes provided essential capital and leadership to bring stability to 120 York and other entities (both personal and corporate) when needed."

As a result of Taylor's affidavit, the lawsuit was settled in March. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed in the one-page notice "to settle, discontinue and end" the litigation.



Hynes did not comment on the settlement, except to say, in a text, "there's more to the story." Taylor did not respond to a text seeking comment.

The theft charges against Hynes are pending.

In June 2024, UDF sold its remaining assets, including its high-speed data lines, to Cablevision Lightpath for $36.6 million, less that half of the company's debt of more than $85 million.

Columnist/reporter Mike Argento has been a York Daily Record staffer since 1982. Reach him at mike@ydr.com.

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https://www.yorkdispatch.com/story/news/loc...ta/83030222007/

Rock band Live's Chad Taylor and Bill Hynes settle defamation suit over United Fiber & Data

Aimee Ambrose
York Dispatch
April 10, 2025

Chad Taylor, rock guitarist and co-founder of now-defunct local tech company United Fiber & Data, admits he falsely accused former business partner Bill Hynes of theft in a Rolling Stone magazine article two years ago.

In a further step, Taylor, in court documents, also refutes allegations in a criminal case that charges Hynes with stealing or misusing funds during his time as CEO of UFD.

“I would also like to set the record straight regarding Mr. Hynes and my involvement with UFD,” Taylor stated in an affidavit.

The document was attached to a March 11 filing that settled a defamation case where Hynes sued Taylor in Philadelphia over the Rolling Stone article.

“The case proves that the Rolling Stone article was indeed a fantasy,” Hynes told The Dispatch. “This case also will shed light on other cases with similar narratives. But it will have a similar outcome, and I am very confident of that.”

Terms of the settlement are confidential, he said.

He also said Taylor provided the affidavit willingly.

“I genuinely think Chad Taylor feels really bad about what happened because he knows I was one of his best friends,” Hynes said.



Taylor didn’t respond to messages seeking further comment on the settlement.

Rolling Stone published the article in February 2023 amid heated legal fights involving Hynes, Taylor and Taylor’s former bandmates with the rock group Live, Chad Gracey and Patrick Dahlheimer, who also served as co-founders of UFD and the related Think Loud businesses in York.

The article centered on Taylor as he recounted his perspectives on the band breaking up, meeting Hynes, starting the local companies, the eventual bitter falling-out with Hynes and Gracey, and four lawsuits that hit him in a flurry in late 2022 and early 2023.

Taylor is cited in the article as calling Hynes “a gifted con artist” while claiming he stole more than $10 million from him, Gracey and Dahlheimer.

“I was a sucker,” Taylor was quoted as saying.

Hynes and Gracey disputed the claims in the article, with Gracey quoted as calling Taylor a narcissist and manipulative.



Hynes responded to the theft allegation by filing the defamation suit three weeks after the article was published, adding to the pile of litigation.

Hynes’ complaint argued that Taylor’s statements in a national publication damaged his business reputation at a time when he explored real estate development opportunities in Philadelphia.

The complaint further accused Taylor of making up the $10 million figure to seem shocking for the article.

When Rolling Stone interviewed Taylor, the Pennsylvania State Police was in the middle of a three-year investigation, with FBI assistance, into accusations that Hynes committed corporate theft from UFD.

A criminal case was filed in August 2023, charging Hynes with felony counts of theft by failing to make required disposition of funds, theft by deception, dealing in proceeds from unlawful activities and knowing about the proceeds from illegal acts.

Investigators alleged that Hynes, 53, stole $4.4 million from UFD while he was CEO from 2017 through 2019. Charging documents detailed about five different situations where police alleged money was embezzled.

The most prominent accusation involved a loan by UFD board member Lou Appell III, whose late father, Louis Appell Jr., was the company’s largest financial supporter.

Appell III agreed to provide a $5 million line of credit for work to renovate a building into UFD and Think Loud’s headquarters at 210 York St. in downtown York City.



The loan for the redevelopment work helped secure a reimbursement of $3.4 million in state funds through Pennsylvania’s Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program in June 2018. Police said a promissory note called for repaying Appell with any amount that RACP provided.

Instead of paying the money back, police alleged Hynes committed theft by transferring the funds into other business accounts. The bulk of the money was then used to purchase the former Metso Minerals plant at 240 Arch St. across from the Think Loud headquarters.

Hynes was also accused of keeping Appell in the dark about the status of the funds for months.

In another situation, investigators accused Hynes of embezzling and disguising about $275,000 in UFDs funds to cover his expenses for participating in stadium super truck racing as one of the other points in the case.

Hynes has argued he’s innocent of the charges.

The theft allegations were initially reported in November 2020 by then-UFD CEO Chris Lodge and company attorney Andrew Paxton.

The two went to the police a month after Appell III had filed a civil lawsuit against Hynes, Taylor and Think Loud. The criminal accusations largely echoed the civil case’s allegations.

The civil case was settled in 2022, about a full year before police filed the criminal case.

The settlement also preceded Hynes’ resolution of a separate criminal case, where he pleaded no contest to charges he physically abused and stalked a woman he was romantically involved with.

The new flurry of civil litigation and Taylor’s interview with Rolling Stone followed soon after.

In settling the defamation case, Taylor said many of his comments were based on his “limited knowledge” at the time.

“I have subsequently learned through discovery that many of my impressions were not complete,” he stated in the affidavit, referring to depositions he underwent during the lawsuits.



Taylor then ventured into the current criminal case by addressing the RACP and racing accusations as he sought in the affidavit to set the record straight on his and Hynes’ involvement with UFD.

He said he was involved in the process to apply for state RACP reimbursements since 2013, and that the company intended to secure funds not just for 210 York St., but also as part of a larger redevelopment effort.

Plans called for acquiring the dilapidated former York County Prison at 319 Chestnut St., which UFD did, and the Metso Minerals plant, and then transforming that area around North Queen and Chestnut streets into a tech and entertainment campus.

The prison was intended to become a data hub for the fiber optic route UFD installed in five states, running between Manhattan and Virginia and with York in the center.



Taylor said in his affidavit he pushed to turn the Metso plant into a casino and entertainment venue, and that he’d publicly pitched the plans.

Taylor also argued that Appell III provided financing for the Metso purchase, and that he’d also strategized with Hynes about repayment in March 2018, a few months before the RACP money came in.

His affidavit shows the plans for Metso and the property’s purchase that July were company actions by UFD, Think Loud and related affiliates, and that he was part of them to where he even offered the Boston Bruins hockey team a mortgage on the property.

Taylor further argued that he supported UFD forming ties with professional auto racing as a marketing strategy, and that he knew Hynes raced stadium super trucks while bearing UFD logos on uniforms and vehicles.

In the criminal case, UFD executives alleged that Hynes’ truck racing was a personal hobby, that he was forbidden from using company funds for it but did so anyway, and that he doctored invoices to conceal expenditures.

Taylor, in his affidavit, argued Hynes’ racing was useful for marketing UFD and affiliated ventures. The company had also partnered with Andretti Autosport as an IndyCar sponsor for the same purpose, the documents show.

He argued the racing and sponsorships benefitted UFD by creating exposure, opening business opportunities and securing client contracts.

Taylor further said he was involved in writing marketing scripts for stadium super trucks, and that the York Revolution’s president had once contacted him about a potential truck racing event.

“I thought that UFD’s involvement in racing endeavors was a good way to promote the company,” he stated in the affidavit, citing the 2014 Indianapolis 500 as an example of getting national exposure for UFD's brand.



Taylor’s affidavit, signed in August 2024, didn’t delve into the other portions of the criminal case.

On those, investigators alleged Hynes funneled UFD money to pay personal credit card debt under the guise of software development; stole from a corporate certificate of deposit and later returned it; and redirected a loan from a trust to make it look like he put up his own funds in a financing request.

When asked about Taylor going into details about the criminal case as part of the settlement in the civil defamation suit, Hynes said he thinks the affidavit speaks for itself.

He said he believes Taylor, through depositions and evidence Hynes’ attorneys accumulated, came to believe UFD executives had lied to him.

“His statements are based on all of the evidence that was uncovered in our thorough investigation that anyone, law enforcement, could have gotten if they had asked the appropriate people,” Hynes said.

The next hearing date in Hynes’ criminal case is scheduled for April 23, court documents show.

The other civil lawsuits filed in 2022 and 2023 are still active.

They involve the current owners of 210 York St. in a property issue; Gracey and some investors suing Taylor over Think Loud financial records; and Hynes suing Taylor, Dalheimer and Gracey over promissory notes from nearly 15 years ago.

UFD, meanwhile, is out of business.

The company, including its fiber networks, was sold to New York-based tech company, Cablevision Lightpath, in a $36.6 million deal that closed in December.

The amount, however, only covered a portion of UFD’s $85 million debt. In a letter announcing the sale to investors, Lodge lamented that most shareholders wouldn’t profit, and some creditors would take substantial losses.

— Reach Aimee Ambrose at aambrose@yorkdispatch.com.

[lankylistener]

the understatement of the last 20 years!!

Terms of the settlement are confidential, he said.

He also said Taylor provided the affidavit willingly.

“I genuinely think Chad Taylor feels really bad about what happened because he knows I was one of his best friends,” Hynes said.

Taylor didn’t respond to messages seeking further comment on the settlement.

He should go and make a public statement and apologize to Bill and the rest of the people he conned with his trash libel.

Slithers away with the "No comment"

Funny also the peanut gallery loudmouths on here who like to throw piles of dung make no comments.

I sense more will be learned in the coming months or more

[SuperHans]

Just an outsider here, but when I saw this and the other thread a week or 2 ago I thought "Oh this again, who cares"

So I don't think people are being quiet because they are wrong or feel embarrassed about things they said or whatever, I think they don't care for this crap anymore.

My $0.02 anyway.

[Bremang]

the understatement of the last 20 years!!



He should go and make a public statement and apologize to Bill and the rest of the people he conned with his trash libel.

Slithers away with the "No comment"

Funny also the peanut gallery loudmouths on here who like to throw piles of dung make no comments.

I sense more will be learned in the coming months or more

you have zero proof, so why should anyone believe anything you say

[OutToDry]

you have zero proof, so why should anyone believe anything you say

You’re a silly man Brett

This post has been edited by OutToDry: Apr 20 2025, 4:10 pm