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jury trial on those allegations. The letter stated: “Since the
alleged damaging conduct; i.e. turning off the pumps, was
intentional conduct, it is my opinion that we have some exposure
for whatever damages resulted from the delay.” The letter then
cited the substantial expense of obtaining expert testimony to
counter petitioner’s and CRI’s expert witness's evaluation of the
well's value, and the additional legal work, in trying the case.
The letter recommended settling the case for $200,000 or less,
characterizing this as a “cost of defense” settlement. The in-
house lawyer at Halliburton used this letter to obtain settlement
authority in the amount of $200,000.
Counsel representing petitioner and CRI sent a proposed
settlement agreement to Halliburton's counsel, which allocated
the entirety of a proposed settlement of $250,000 to petitioner
“Individually, for mental anguish, pain and suffering, damage to
his reputation and loss of good will”, with no allocation to CRI.
Halliburton's counsel responded by returning the proposed
agreement after changing the settlement amount to $200,000 and
deleting the language allocating it to petitioner individually
for personal injury claims. Halliburton's counsel deleted the
allocation language because he was concerned that CRI might later
be able to disavow the settlement, based on absence of
consideration, if the settlement proceeds were allocated entirely
to petitioner. Counsel for CRI and petitioner nevertheless
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