Zimmermann Lawsuit Headed to Trial

The Dane County (Wisc.) corporation counsel says that an outside attorney has recommended against settling the civil lawsuit filed by the family of Brittany Zimmermann, who was murdered in her apartment in April 2008, despite her call to 911. The county council will likely follow the advice, setting the stage for a full civil trial against the county and former dispatcher Rita Gahagan. The family had proposed a settlement of $150,000, court documents say. Gahagan answered the 911 call from Zimmermann’s apartment did not send officers to investigate, and a call-back to a second unrelated 911 call was apparently mistaken to have settled that the Zimmermann call was accidental. Zimmermann’s boyfriend arrived about 40 minutes after the call and discovered her dead. No suspect has been arrested in the case. Gahagan had requested a transfer to another county agency before the incident, and was moved out of the comm center shortly after the incident. An investigation found she mishandled the 911 call, and she was suspended without pay for three days. The logging tape of the call has never been released, but sources say it clearly depicts the sounds of a struggle, although comm center officials contend the volume of that noise during the original call may have been much lower or obscured by noise in the comm center. Earlier this year a county judge dismissed portions of the family’s lawsuit that claimed the center was under-funded, and against Gahagan and county executive Kathleen Falk individually.