Hard to explain - esp is a formal verilog tool. The problem was that it wouldn't properly end on $finish down certain branches. Here is the code:
module test; reg [1:0] fred; reg [1:0] fred_sym; initial begin $esp_var(fred_sym); fred=fred_sym; // Don't allow this value if (fred===2'b01) $finish; // So how can it happen here? if (fred===2'b01) $esp_error("How did this happen?"); end endmodule