The average 1.6 million dollar payments to 9/11 families were part of a settlement mainly to avoid litigation. My heart went out to those families, but payments should have been based on social welfare needs only. Otherwise we have the victims of the Oklahoma city bombing feeling snubbed.

All the harassment cases that I know about have been shakedowns, even the O’Reilly suit. But, Mike, in general, payments of significant sums of money will be admission of guilt no matter what legal kabuki is brought to the case.

I can’t see how Victoria can justify $1.3 million for hurt feelings. A dozen roses usually works for us insensitive husbands.

It is also true that employers get hit with frivolous lawsuits all the time, especially here in California. Too many plaintiff’s attorneys and too few legitimate instances of employment abuse.

And so I understand completely the need for defendants to settle and exonerate themselves at the same time.

However, fraudulent arbitrations is not the way to do it.

Settle with a confidentiality agreement, and a liquidated damages provision for its breach. The LD can be a return of the settlement amount.

Or how about skip the fake arbitration and just issue a stipulated press release that both sides agree on. The plaintiff dismissed the case because of difficulty in proof, or because it turned out to be a legitimate miscommunication that has been resolved, not sexual harassment (or whatever) at all. For $1.3 million, the plaintiff will probably agree to it. With careful wordsmithing, the press release may even be not completely misleading.

The point is, there are other ways for the defendant, even a wrongly accused one, to exonerate itself in the public’s eye without resorting to a sham “legal proceeding” that risks diminishing the legitimacy and acceptance of arbitration as a viable alternative to the courts for a just method of resolving real disputes.

The question of whether settlement can be employed as a means of removing some of the stain a publicly-aired claim imposes on the defendant is being wrestled with by the courts (see, e.g., Asti Comm. v. The Shaar Fund, Ltd., 2d Cir. No. 08-1815, decided October 20, 2008 (available at http://tinyurl.com/6bcz2c )(refusing to vacate District Court sanction order as provided for in settlement)) and self regulatory organizations in the securities industry (see FINRA/NASD Rule 2130 (available at http://tinyurl.com/59d64o )(requiring arbitration panels to issue express evidence-based findings in order for settlement agreements providing for “expungement” of reference to claim against securities brokers from publicly available records)). The crude means that this defendant sought to employ to permit settlement to be seen as exoneration should not obscure the fact that such exoneration is often a valid goal when adversaries seek to settle a messy dispute.