The Brewer School Department will pay $350,000 to the estate of a local conservative activist after reaching a settlement.
The amount was disclosed this week after the lawsuit was dismissed in U.S. District Court of Maine in Bangor. The settlement was reached March 22, the day before it was supposed to go to trial.
Neither side admits liability and the school will pay Shawn McBreairty’s widow. The money will come from the school’s insurance, attorney Jonathan Brogan said.
The lawsuit’s dismissal is the final step in the years-long case centered around an online post McBreairty published in February 2024 about girls’ bathrooms not being safe if males are present. It had a picture of students in a Brewer High School bathroom, including a transgender student.
After it was published, the Brewer School Department requested McBreairty remove three parts of the article, including the picture. McBreairty removed the article, then sued the school department alleging it violated his First Amendment rights by alluding to taking legal action if he did not take the post down.
McBreairty died by suicide June 3, 2024. His widow, Patricia McBreairty, continued the lawsuit.
Neither side admitted liability in the settlement, which is a “compromise” in a disputed claim, according to the settlement. The case was officially dismissed in U.S. District Court of Maine in Bangor on Wednesday with prejudice, meaning it cannot be refiled, and without costs, meaning neither side will pay the other’s legal fees.
“Brewer [schools] and Superintendent [Gregg] Palmer will continue to try to protect students and employees of the school from bullying from any source,” Brogan said.
If the lawsuit had continued to a jury trial, Brogan said he was confident they would have won. But there was the potential of the school having to pay very high legal fees to McBreairty, which made a settlement appropriate, he said.
“As the case is now resolved, hopefully Mrs. [McBreairty] and her family can find some peace and hopefully use any proceeds from the settlement to foster compassion and understanding even with those whose ideas and lifestyles you don’t agree,” Brogan said.
When asked for a statement Thursday, McBreairty’s attorney, Mac Randazza, said “The Bangor Daily News must be heartbroken that any measure of justice was done here and that its patrons have had any measure of accountability.”
McBreairty’s estate had asked the judge to allow testimony that the distress caused by his lawsuit contributed to his death. The judge declined to allow that evidence if the case had gone to trial.
The settlement also releases the school from legal actions related to “known and unknown personal injuries, death, property damage and other damages of whatever kind” between the article publishing and McBreairty’s death.
The school has said it will not fight the republishing of the article, in part, because the targeted student has graduated.
