Disgraced former professional cyclist Lance Armstrong has reached a settlement with the British newspaper the Sunday Times, according to the paper.The 2012 legal dispute between Mr. Armstrong and the Sunday Times stems from the Texan's 2004 libel lawsuit against the newspaper and two journalists over a full-page article alleging that he used banned substances.
The 2004 article contained some of the allegations against Mr. Armstrong that were made in "LA Confidentiel: The Secrets of Lance Armstrong," a book about the cyclist by Irish journalist David Walsh and French sportswriter Pierre Ballester. "LA Confidentiel" was published in 2004 in France, where the libel laws are seen as less burdensome to journalists than in the U.K., but it wasn't published in English.
In 2006, the newspaper paid Mr. Armstrong about £300,000 to settle the case, which also named Mr. Walsh, the paper's chief sportswriter, and Alan English, the paper's former deputy sports editor, people familiar with the matter said. Lawyers for the newspaper decided they couldn't risk a jury trial, because, according to one person familiar with their thinking, they feared that under U.K. libel laws, the evidence Messrs. Walsh and Ballester had gathered through interviews might not satisfy a U.K. jury that Mr. Armstrong was a cheat.
In 2012, U.S. antidoping officials stripped Mr. Armstrong of his seven Tour de France titles for doping, and banned him from elite-level sport competition for life. The officials released much of the evidence they had gathered against Mr. Armstrong, including the affidavits of several of his former teammates who provided testimony against him.
The Sunday Times in late 2012 sued Mr. Armstrong in the High Court for the return of the money that it paid him plus more than £720,000 in costs, accusing him of deceit. The newspaper argued in its lawsuit that Mr. Armstrong's libel suit had been baseless.
In an article on Sunday, the newspaper said it, as well as Messrs. Walsh and English, had reached a "mutually acceptable final resolution" to its 2012 High Court proceedings.
The Sunday Times said it is "entirely happy with the agreed settlement, the terms of which remain confidential."
A spokeswoman for the Sunday Times declined to comment on the settlement. Tim Herman, a lawyer for Mr. Armstrong, didn't immediately return a message seeking comment on the settlement. Another of his lawyers, Robert Luskin, a partner at Patton Boggs LLP, in Washington, declined to comment.