to foil a takeover bid by dart group corp., management took supermarkets general private in a $2.1 billion leveraged buyout in 1987, in which merrill lynch capital markets inc. received 55 percent of the shares, equitable life assurance society of the u.s., 35 percent, with management retaining 10 percent. servicing the debt ($1.6 billion in early 1990, half of it in junk bonds) soon proved a problem. the company sold 25 of its free-standing drug stores in new hampshire and massachusetts to the mellville corp., which at the time operated cvs stores.