Not likely. Directly from the article:Also, what JB said above.

That's how it looks but I'm not 100% sold. Taking an airplane which was in the midst of major maintenance seems almost suicidal. Bizarre that a CFI would do something that dangerous (especially with pax) The pilot must have known it was there for repairs, since it had been arranged for him to ferry it when it was done. What made him think that was OK? We are of course only getting one side of the story at this point.

Although he also flew an airplane which he didn't have endorsements for, so there's that. Maybe this was just the Darwin component of the 1500-hour rule in action.

There’s more to this story.
It could have been an “authorized” shake down flight and the A&P/AI is blatantly lying.
Being a scumbag is not disqualifying to become a mechanic or a pilot.
$6,000 is a joke for an airplane that hasn’t flown for years and I’ll bet you it was sold out of a bankruptcy or similar.

Back in the day we had a 310Q (?) divert to our airport with an engine shutdown due to low oil pressure and high temp.
Absolute wreck of an airplane. I shuddered just looking at it. Our A&P/AI said no I’m not touching it. I’ll sell you a case of oil and you can put it in yourself.