Court Opinion

ID: 9585416
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:00:14.917082+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:43:47.484366
License: Public Domain

Felton, J.,
dissenting. Upon cursory examination of the questions raised in this case, I thought that the case should be considered by the court as a whole for the reason that I did not think that this court had sufficiently gone into the questions so insistently urged in this case. In my judgment the Moore case, relied on by the majority, is but a physical precedent, in that, as I understand the opinion, there is no discussion in that case of the point made here, to wit, that a covenant not to sue made lis pendens is a misnomer and is in reality a release. In the short time I have had to study the question, I have found many cases holding that a so-called covenant not to sue, executed lis pendens, did not release codefendants, but I have not found one that went into and discussed the why’s and wherefore’s of the conclusion reached. The conclusion reached by many courts, including ours, that a release of a joint tort-feasor releases all, but a covenant not to sue does not, despite the fact that a covenant not to sue is a release as to the one to whom it is given, frankly baffles me. See Editor’s note, 53 A.L.R. 1470. To my mind a covenant not to sue when an action has already been filed is an anomaly if not an impossibility. Such an agreement seeks to covenant not to do a whole thing, a part of which has already been done and can have no more legal effect than an agreement that black is white when the rights of a third party are concerned. The agreement in this case did not covenant to dismiss the action and did not provide how protection was to *634be afforded the covenantee. The protection had to be by dismissal of the action or forbearance to collect the judgment rendered, or forbearance to take a judgment against the covenantee. I think that either of the latter methods would have amounted to a release. I think also that the dismissal would have been a release. I think the case is the same as if the whole agreement had been one to dismiss the action as to the covenantee for a consideration, which I think would have been a release. To say that the law must take the agreement of the parties to be as expressed in the agreement, no matter under what circumstances it was given, is to render the law impotent to strike down frauds, travesties and deceit. A covenant not to sue an action already filed is not a covenant not to sue, no matter what it is called by the parties or anybody else. A release of-one party has been held to be a release of joint tort-feasors when the instrument provided that it did not release joint tort-feasors. Bee v. Cooper, 217 Cal. 96 (17 Pac. 2d, 740). Judge Yankwick, who tried the case just cited, as District Judge wrote the opinion in Jenkins v. Sou. Pac. Co., 17 Fed. Supp. 820. In the Jenkins case the covenant was similar to the instant one. In that case it was held that the covenant not to sue while action was pending was a release even though the parties denominated it a covenant not to sue. In that case the agreement included a statement that the plaintiff did not “waive” his rights as to other defendants and it was held that such provision showed a waiver as to the covenantee. So, in this case, a reservation of rights as to the other defendant shows just as convincingly a waiver of the plaintiff’s rights as to the covenantee, and a release of the claim and cause of action against him. In Petroyeanis v. Pirola, 205 Ill. App. 310, it was held: “Where, pending an appeal from a judgment against two defendants in an action in tort, one of such defendants received from the plaintiff in such action, in consideration of a certain sum paid by such defendant, an agreement by the plaintiff to také no action in law or equity or prosecute any writ of execution on such judgment to obtain satisfaction thereof from such defendant, held that such agreement was not a ‘covenant not to sue’ but was a release and payment of the judgment as against both defendants, notwithstanding such was not the intention of the parties as expressed *635in such agreement.” In my judgment there should be no distinction between the effect of a covenant not to sue a joint tortfeasor and a release of such a one, but so long as there is a difference there should be strict adherence to the rule. The law should not add to the anomalous holdings one to the effect that a party can do an impossible thing by agreeing not to do what he has already done and call a spade a club with impunity.