First Settlement Offer in AtPac case $30,000 - The Union

"Nevada County paid $1.9 million in a lawsuit settlement this week, nearly $1 million more than a settlement offered earlier in the case. County officials maintained Thursday that nothing had changed between the offer and the final settlement, other than the hundreds of thousands racked up in legal fees.

"In the switch from Aptitude to AtPac, county employees and Diaz, allowed Aptitude access to AtPac's trade secrets, AtPac said in the suit filed in the Eastern District of California federal court in Sacramento. County officials denied any wrongdoing in the settlement, which was announced Tuesday.

"AtPac originally offered to settle for $30,000 in fall 2009 — before it filed a lawsuit in the case, Thomas said.

"Thomas pointed out that AtPac also had offered to settle the case for $1 million last year, and called into question the county's legal strategy.

"'Instead...the county engages in months of litigation and racks up legal fees,' Thomas said. 'And then they settled. Who's the Einstein that settled on that strategy?'"

"AtPac offered the settlement in September 2010, said County Board of Supervisors Chair Ed Scofield.

"'At that time there was no indication the county had done anything wrong,' Scofield said. 'The $1 million seemed very extreme and the defense cost was minimal at that time.'"

The entire story in The Union is here.

My experience with Michael Jamison and Diaz is that they are both very dishonest and will spin facts beyond the point of truth in order to cover their wrongdoing. My experience with Ed Scofield is that he is a straight shooter who tells it like it is...whether you like it or not.

While Michael Jamison (who recently resigned) asserts that neither he, nor the County staff, nor Diaz did anything wrong, we see the honesty of Scofield in the article when he said that "at that time there was no indication the county had done anything wrong."

I would posit to the people of the County that after Diaz' deposition and after AtPac filed for summary judgment, the County (and the County's insurance) knew the writing was on the wall and it was time to pay for Diaz' wrongdoing. Insurance will only pay at settlement if, and only if, they think that they will end up paying more at trial.

The County's insurance paid a total of $2.745 million. Clearly, insurance attempts to minimize these claims...and clearly the insurance knew that if this case went to trial they would be on the hook for far greater than $3 million.

So, yes, settling was a business decision by the board of supervisors and the insurance company, but to assert that the settlement was not based on Diaz' and the County misconduct is just absurd.  Diaz and the County need to give The Union a copy of Diaz' deposition and prove us all wrong.