Opinion ID: 16996
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Settlement Crediting

Text: 8 Gateway argues in this appeal that the district court should have reduced the limitation fund dollar-for-dollar to reflect the Castillo settlement. 2 The eventual limitation fund amount was $190,000, the Castillo claimants settled for $650,000, and Gateway therefore argues that the Castillo settlement exhausted the limitation amount and that the Ramirez claimants should take nothing. 9 This contention lacks merit. Dollar-for-dollar crediting of settlement amounts is incompatible with Supplemental Rule F(8), which states that [u]pon determination of liability, the limitation fund shall be divided pro rata, ... among the several claimants in proportion to the amounts of their respective claims. Fed.R.Civ.P. Supp. Rule F(8). A rule that the limitation fund should be reduced, dollar-for-dollar, by the amount of the settlement entered into by the shipowner is thus inconsistent with the approach taken in F(8), which simply divides the entire limitation amount among claimants. See Bouchard Transp. Co. v. Updegraff, 147 F.3d 1344, 1347 (11th Cir.1998) (Rule F implements the provisions of the Limitation Act by providing a mechanism for the pro rata distribution among claimants of the fund created by the Limitation Act's liability limits.). Therefore, the district court did not err in refusing to decrease the limitation fund available to the Ramirez claimants to reflect dollar-for-dollar crediting of the Castillo settlement.