I called end of Register lawsuit

Back in August, I predicted that a lawsuit by carriers against the Orange County Register, my old newspaper, would end in a settlement. That the union would see no utility in holding out for its demand for $100 million from a company close to bankruptcy.

Bingo.

Yesterday, the company and the carriers settled the lawsuit for $22 million, plus $11 million for the carriers’ lawyers.  The settlement means that the Register management admitted it cheated its own employees.

I hypothetically posited a $10 million settlement. But that wasn’t so much a guess and an example of how things work.

I predicted a settlement …

will clear the decks for selling the company, probably by breaking it up and auctioning the pieces. It’ll be accomplished before Rudolph and Santa alight on your rooftop.

The Hoiles Family, one of the last of the old newspaper families, seems to have given up.

A friend of mine was at the Arizona Republic in the mid-1990s when the Pulliam Family (Dan Quayle’s family) put its newspapers up for sale. He said that the first priority was settling all lawsuits. That way, the new owner couldn’t come back to the old owners in a few years and say, “You owe me more money for those lawsuits you didn’t settle.”

Now, Freedom is free to sell the Register.

Assuming anybody wants to buy it.