Lance Armstrong settles insurance case out of court

Lance Armstrong has avoided having to give a deposition under oath in a case relating to bonuses paid to him following three of the seven Tour de France victories he was stripped of last year – by reaching an out-of-court settlement with the insurance company that was suing him.

Acceptance Insurance Company was seeking to recover $3 million paid in bonuses that it had insured for Armstrong’s first three wins in the race, from 1999 to 2001.

The disgraced cyclist had been due to give a pre-trial deposition under oath tomorrow, but USA Today reports his attorney, Tim Herman, as saying that the action had been "resolved to the mutual satisfaction of the parties," without giving details of the settlement.

The newspaper says that under the terms of the settlement, written responses Armstrong made to questions raised by Acceptance will not now be made public.

Earlier this week, in the whistleblower case originally brought by former US Postal Service team mate and which the federal government has joined, attorney’s for Armstrong sought unsuccessfully to consolidate his depositions in that and other lawsuits he is facing.

They had argued that separate depositions in each case meant that he would be subject to questioning on similar issues from different teams of lawyers in the separate lawsuits, but the judge sitting on the federal case turned down the request.