What a Settlement Announcement Should Say, and What It Should Not.

It should say what the institution did, as the record shows it, what it has agreed to, and who the people were. It should give the number only if the number is public, and it should give the number second, never first. It should not characterize the defendant beyond the record, it should not gloat, and it should not say anything the settlement agreement forbids. A settlement announced as a dollar figure reads as a cost of doing business. Announced as an account of what happened, it reads as a warning to the next institution.

Write it before the signature

The announcement is drafted and approved by counsel before the agreement is signed, so it goes out the moment it is, before the defendant’s statement can set the frame. For the Johns Hopkins settlement, I gave one detail-oriented reporter at the AP the full record early. She had time to read it all and get it right. The moment the settlement was signed, I called her, and the story went out on the wire. Coverage followed from around the world, and the AP described the settlement as one of the largest on record in the U.S. involving sexual misconduct by a physician. The number was in the story. It was not the story.

What it should say

What the record shows the institution did, in plain words. What the institution has agreed to, including any change in practice, which is often the part the next institution notices. Who the people at the center of the case were, with consent, and never in a way that exposes any of them again. How the fund will be administered, if that is public. A statement from counsel that says what the case established, not how it feels.

What it should not say

Any figure that is not already public. I do not publish settlement figures that are not already public, including numbers that would flatter me, and neither should the announcement. Anything the agreement’s confidentiality terms forbid; counsel reads those terms before I write a word. Anything about the defendant’s motives or character beyond what the record shows. Anything that sounds like a victory lap, because the people who were harmed are reading it too.

Who hears it after the wire

The claimants, the same day, in plain language, through counsel: what was agreed, what happens next, and when. For the Hopkins settlement I held the press conference online, after the wire story had gone out, so reporters anywhere could ask their questions directly. The conference answered questions. It did not break the news. The Hopkins case → The verdict story is not the dollar figure →