October 1, 1990: Mediation Attempt in PROMIS Dispute Sabotaged by Leak to Washington Post

The Washington Post reports that the Justice Department has asked an appeals court to consider its dispute with Inslaw over enhanced PROMIS software for mediation. The request was made several months earlier (see June 28, 1990), but the process requires confidentially, so the leak forces Inslaw to withdraw and ends the mediation attempts. The House Judiciary Committee will comment that the leak was “completely contrary to the standards of the Appellate Program.” The committee will add: “It is difficult to understand the department’s strategy by this action. It may be that the department wanted to maintain the facade of working diligently to settle a sticky contract dispute while working behind the scenes to sabotage it and keep pressure on Inslaw by forcing it to expend additional resources on legal support during the mediation process. If this is the case, the department was successful. But the department also succeeded in maintaining a near-flawless record of seeking delay over resolution and raising the level of suspicion about its motives to a point where the public trust in the untarnished pursuit of justice is subject to grave doubts.” [US Congress, 9/10/1992]