In this case, it was the company that was being sued, and the assistant was there to represent the company. Which sounds perfectly reasonable. It would be nice, but there's certainly no expectation for the CEO/owner to attend every single court case.
All the emails and negotiations are between him and the other guy. It's not like his company is a multinational with billions in revenue and the CEO on another continent. It was absolutely a huge mistake not to show up personally.
