UO rejected $600K offer, will now pay ~$1.5M for Bowl of Dicks

The BBC reports that the Ashmolean only paid £250,00 for their bowl:

So far UO’s tab is:

$452,200 Attorney Fees to plaintiff’s lawyers
$ 45,773 Costs to plaintiff
$650,000 Economic damages
$105,000 Punitive damages
$1,252,973 Total

Then of course you have to add in the many billable hours UO’s outside lawyer Andrea Coit charged, as well as the other HLGR lawyers, paralegals, transcripts, etc. Another $250K seems conservative for all that.

So it was interesting to read in the motion from former UOPD Officer James Cleavenger’s attorneys about legal fees (available free here, thanks to the late and much missed Aaron Swartz and recapthelaw.org) that UO rejected an offer from Cleavenger to settle pre-trial for $600K, and didn’t even seriously try to bargain:

 A very expensive decision, in retrospect. The docket is here. I’m no expert on law and economics, but one of the main functions of the pre-trial process of discovery and depositions is to give both sides a good understanding of their likely prospects at trial, and thereby encourage the parties to reach an reasonable settlement before incurring still more wasteful legal costs.

What went wrong with that here?