Opinion ID: 1845492
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Heading Rank: 1

Heading: In Pahl v. Tri-City R. Co., 190 Iowa 1364, 1367, 1368, 181 N.W. 670, 671, a case quite analogous to this, we said:

Text: It is well settled that compromises and settlements will not be disturbed for any ordinary mistake either of law or of fact, since their very object is to settle disputes without judicial controversy. In the absence of fraud, misrepresentations, concealment, or other misleading incidents, a compromise into which parties voluntarily enter must stand and be enforced, although the final issue may be different from that which was anticipated. `In such classes of agreements and transactions the parties are supposed to calculate the chances, and they certainly assume the risks, where there is no element of bad faith, breach of confidence, misrepresentation, probable concealment, or other like conduct, amounting to actual or constructive fraud.' 2 Pom.Eq. [Jurisprudence] (4th Ed.) 855. Plaintiff herein signed the release with full knowledge of what it contained, and no claim is made that he did not understand its terms and provisions. It cannot be said that there was any mistake inducing the compromise. Both parties were innocent and acted in good faith. Neither can it be argued that the payment was made and the release signed for a certain known injury. It was a settlement made to avoid litigation, and subsequently plaintiff discovered that his own doctor was mistaken as to the character of the injury which plaintiff received. Where parties knowingly and purposely make an agreement to compromise and settle a doubtful claim whose character and extent are conditioned upon future contingencies, such settlement may not be avoided simply because the event happened quite differently from the expectation, opinion, or belief of one or both of the parties. Seymour v. Chicago & N. W. R. Co., 181 Iowa, 218, 164 N.W. 352. In the opinion in the Seymour Case this language is approved: 'The subsequent discovery by one giving such a release that he was worse hurt than he had supposed, would not, in and of itself, be ground for setting aside the settlement or limiting the release.' The opinion distinguishes earlier cases including Reddington v. Blue & Raftery, 168 Iowa 34, 149 N.W. 933 (cited by plaintiff here) as involving matter written into the release which was not intended nor in fact made by the parties thereto. There is no subsequent decision in which we have modified or repudiated the language above quoted from the Pahl case. Plaintiff's principal reliance here is on our later decision in Jordan v. Brady Transfer & Storage Co., 226 Iowa 137, 284 N.W. 73. The distinction between that and the instant case is obvious. In the Jordan case plaintiff's doctor, after setting the fractured arm (fractured in two places) mistakenly told him on September 18, the bones were uniting and that there would be complete union by December 1. On the strength of this assumed situation an agreement not to sue was made for an amount sufficient to cover loss of wages and expense on that basis. It later became clear there never had been or could be any union because the section of bone between the two fractures was dead and had to be removed so the live parts could be brought together to attain final union. In that case there was no doubt the doctor's mistake induced the settlement which was for an amount expressly computed to cover plaintiff's loss as it would have been had the doctor not been mistaken. Here there was a settlement for a lump sum having no relation to any computation based on estimated loss of time and expense. The parties clearly intended to cover future developments whatever they might be. There is nothing to be gained by discussion of other cases in which the facts are not comparable to those here. In fact plaintiff discusses and seems to rely only on the Jordan case which, as we have pointed out, is clearly distinguishable. II. Plaintiff testifies that if she had known she would experience and suffer the conditions that have since arisen she would not have made the settlement. But that does not help her case. Practically every settlement for personal injury involves the element of chance as to future consequences and developments. There are usually unknown and unknowable conditions (congential or otherwise) that may affect the ultimate recovery of failure of recovery. Mutual ignorance of their existence cannot constitute mutual mistake. No two persons have the same power of recuperation and the settlement is an agreement by which both take the chance that the amount paid may eventually prove to have been too great or too small. Where, as here, there is no serious dispute as to defendant's liability, the only unknown element is the one that concerns what may eventually be the consequences of the injury. If that could be known the transaction would be, not compromise, but payment. The fact, if it be a fact, that plaintiff's unknown congenital spinal deformity delayed her recovery and aggravated her suffering does not constitute ignorance of its existence a mistake of fact. III. It is unnecessary to pass on the contention of defendant that plaintiff's tender back of the amount received in settlement was neither sufficient nor timely, since we hold there was no evidence of mutual mistake justifying submission of that issue to the jury. The case will be reversed and remanded and the trial court instructed to enter judgment for defendant in accordance with Rule 349, Iowa R.C.P. Reversed and remanded. All Justices concur, except MANTZ, J., not sitting.