Revel Sale Appears Dead. Again.

Photo | Dan McQuade

There will be no “university for geniuses,” it appears.

Officials with the bankrupt Revel Casino said overnight they will ask a judge today to cancel the planned sale of the shuttered business to Florida developer Glenn Straub — and to allow them to keep his $10 million deposit. An attorney for Straub said he would challenge Revel’s right to keep that deposit.

“Revel AC originally said it planned to scrap a deal to sell the shuttered casino to Glenn Straub for $95.4 million at 12:01 a.m., just after the midnight deadline for the sale had passed,” AP reports. “But a Revel attorney told The Associated Press moments after the deadline had passed that the termination notice, in the form of a request to a bankruptcy court judge to let it cancel the deal, will be filed sometime during business hours Tuesday morning.”

It would be the second time a planned purchase of the casino failed. The first attempted sale to Brookfield Asset Management collapsed in December.

The problem this time? Concerns over the fate of several businesses still operating at the casino building, including several restaurants and a $160 million power plant that serves the building. “Florida developer Glen Straub wanted to buy the casino without any obligation to existing leases held by the bars, clubs and restaurants that operated inside the hotel, according to court papers,” Reuters reports.

Straub first attracted attention as a Revel bidder back in September, when he announced plans to put a “university for geniuses” next to the casino.