Settlement Agreement, the signature page.

And so, more than two years after the sub-standard evaluation of Satisfactory I received on August 26, 2015 that caused me to file a formal complaint of age discrimination, and more than a year after I amended my formal complaint with additional allegations of a hostile work environment which culminated in my involuntary retirement in May 2016, the settlement was entered. It was with irony that I signed the document exactly two years after my bogus review. The court entered it on September 20, 2017. My final review, the one we were arguing about for all that time, was changed to Outstanding in every category.

Most people don't pursue their righteous complaints to this degree, and that's what the system, be it government, private, corporate or institutional, counts on. It takes too long. It jeopardizes your livelihood. It's shrouded in secrecy. This agreement does not contain an NDA. I wouldn't have signed one that did. That's how the system beats down individuals, because they don't know who went before them and how it came out. The culture of deceit, impropriety and even illegality, is exposed when light is shined upon it and it may then change.

Why did I do it? "Mine honor is my life, both grow in one; Take honor from me, and my life is done." R2 I.i.182-3.

Below is a picture of me at the office on the day of my 25th anniversary of government service as an attorney. My friends threw a surprise party for me in my office and I was feeling proud about my work and good about my situation. A month later I received my bogus review based upon what I believed to be age discrimination, with in my opinion a generous helping of vindictiveness baked into it, and my two year battle with the system to have a proper review entered began. I persevered and prevailed. Read the settling document and tell me otherwise. I miss my friends at my former agency though, and wish them all good fortune.