Appellate Practice Attorney serving New York, NY
When you say that you own 20% of a small business, I assume you mean that you own 20% of an llc, corporation, or similar entity. While I am not a Missouri attorney, in all jurisdictions I know, a 20% owner of an entity has the statutory right to see certain information relating to the entity, particularly financial documentation (in some jurisdictions, a provision in the governing agreement which provides to the contrary, i.e. that you do not have such a right, might trump the statute, but I doubt it.) You can demand access to that information and, if refused, a Court will enforce your right. Once you have seen the documentation, you may be able to figure out if the majority owner is doing anything else wrong, for example embezzling funds from the entity, paying personal expenses from entity money, distributing profits to himself but not minority owners, etc.
Answered on Nov 03rd, 2014 at 1:20 PM