If Todd Lane, president/CEO of the $3.3 billion Cal Coast Credit Union in San Diego, is a dictator, then "he's pretty bad at it."
That's what one of Cal Coast's lawyers said during a court hearing last week when the credit union asked State Judge Carolyn M. Caietti to grant a preliminary injunction to block the termination of its merger agreement with the $9.2 billion San Diego County Credit Union (SDCCU). The proposed consolidation was called off by SDCCU because of Cal Coast's alleged "culture of non-compliance," an allegation that Cal Coast vehemently denied and described as a manufactured excuse to retrade the merger deal.
SDCCU asked Caietti to deny the preliminary injunction, arguing that the merger would create unacceptable risks for a $12 billion cooperative that would face scrutiny from state and federal regulators. Cal Coast asked the judge to grant the injunction to maintain the status quo until a trial resolves the legal dispute.
According to Cal Coast, maintaining the status quo meant prohibiting SDCCU from taking any action that would prevent the consummation of the merger. SDCCU, however, argued that doing so would be impractical because the credit unions are incompatible.
Nevertheless, a contentious issue that surfaced during the March 3 court hearing involved the alleged comments made by Lane.
"I want to respond to the repeated suggestion, which is supported only by self-serving notes from Ms. Kissick and SDCCU, that Mr. Lane is some sort of dictator," Cal Coast attorney Blair Connelly said.
Throughout the hearing, SDCCU attorney Derek L. Shaffer referred to Lane's alleged dictator remarks about five times, suggesting Lane was not concerned about compliance issues and did not see them as obstacles to completing the proposed consolidation.
However, an alleged statement made by Lane during a September 2025 meeting apparently alarmed SDCCU. During that meeting, SDCCU EVP for Enterprise Risk Management Carolyn Kissick suggested that the combined entity have increased compliance controls. Lane allegedly berated her and declared himself to be a dictator.
"I run a dictatorship and I am the dictator. I do not care what you say or what you think," Lane allegedly said. "I do not care what anyone says or what anyone thinks."
That statement came from Kissick's contemporaneous notes taken during the meeting, which were included in a sworn statement.
But Connelly dismissed those notes, saying, "It's easy to write that down on a piece of paper. The actual communications between the parties tell a different story."
During the hearing, Connelly pointed to an evidentiary slide that showed a text message Lane sent to SDCCU President/CEO Teresa Campbell stating that he and Campbell would make the decisions. He also said Lane made the same point during the September meeting.
Connelly noted the CEOs privately discussed competing recommendations, which apparently came from the integration steering committee. Ultimately, the decision was made to move forward with SDCCU's proposed solution, he said.
"So respectfully, if Mr. Lane is a dictator, he's pretty bad at it because he's a dictator who keeps giving Ms. Campbell what she wants," Connelly said.
SDCCU's compliance concerns initially surfaced during the merger's integration planning process last year. The credit union said it uncovered multiple compliance problems and other operational issues that Cal Coast allegedly did not disclose. SDCCU claimed these non-disclosures and alleged false representations materially breached the merger agreement, giving it the right to terminate the deal.
Cal Coast countered that SDCCU's consultant identified no material adverse findings during due diligence and that the noncompliance claims are based on memos created by a law firm SDCCU hired to prepare for the integration process. These memos recommended ways to mitigate risk, but they did not reach a conclusion of non-compliance or show any legal violations, according to Cal Coast.
A decision on the preliminary injunction is expected to be announced in April.
Peter Strozniak can be reached at peter.strozniak@arc-network.com.
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