Court Opinion

ID: 9743091
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:25:24.61432+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:39.245821
License: Public Domain

NIERENGARTEN, Judge
(concurring in part, dissenting in part).
I respectfully concur in part and dissent in part.
I agree with the majority that the joint and several liability between Pittsburgh and Manville has not been destroyed. In Frey v. Snelgrove, 269 N.W.2d 918 (Minn.1978), the supreme court stated:
By the terms of this type of release the nonsettling defendant will never be required to pay more than his fair share as determined by the jury’s finding of comparative negligence.
Id. at 921; see also Bartels v. City of Williston, 276 N.W.2d 113, 122 (N.D.1979). The court in Frey, as well as in Bartels, held that a plaintiff waived the statutory provision for joint liability by entering into a Pierringer type release. Both cases, however, only involved one nonsettling defendant; there are two such defendants in the present case.
Both courts were concerned with the situation where a nonsettling defendant would be liable for the percentages of fault attributed to the settling defendants. To prevent this potential abuse, the courts held that a plaintiff could not recover the entire judgment based on the joint and several liability between the cotortfeasors, thereby precluding the plaintiff from holding the nonsettlors jointly liable for the liability attributed to the settling defendants. In this sense, the nonsettlors are only severally liable to the plaintiff. In other words, a plaintiff was precluded from receiving a double recovery by not requiring a nonsettling defendant to pay a portion of the judgment which had already been satisfied. Accordingly, joint liability was severed only between the settling and nonsettling defendants. The Frey court made this clear when it stated: “Since the nonsettling defendant is relieved from paying more than his fair share of the verdict, the other defendants may properly be dismissed from further participation in the trial.” Frey, 269 N.W.2d at 922; see also Uniform Comparative Fault Act, § 6 illustration 11 12 U.L.A. 49 (Supp.1985); Steenson, “Comparative Fault and Loss Reallocation” vol. 6, no. 5 Minnesota Trial Lawyers, 27 (1981).
I also agree that the reallocation provision of Minn.Stat. § 604.02, subd. 2 (1982) does not apply to this case. Manville was not a party to the present action. Reallocation applies only when “all or part of a party’s equitable share of the obligation is uncollectible from that party * * *.” Minn.Stat. § 604.02, subd. 2 (1982) (emphasis added).
I respectfully dissent from that portion of the majority’s opinion which applies equitable contribution principles. Where one tortfeasor has paid more than his share of the judgment, there exists a right to contribution from the other tortfeasors. Lange v. Schweitzer, 295 N.W.2d 387, 390 (Minn.1980). In some situations, however, it is possible under our comparative fault statute that a defendant may be liable for a cotortfeasor’s percentage of fault in addition to their own. In Jack Frost v. Engineered Building Components, 304 N.W.2d 346 (Minn.1981), one defendant was more negligent than the plaintiff while the other *819defendant was less negligent than the plaintiff. Even though the less negligent defendant wasn’t liable to the plaintiff, the supreme court held that the more negligent defendant was liable for the entire amount of the plaintiff’s damages reduced only by the percentage of negligence attributed to the plaintiff.
Although the trial court’s result may not seem fair, Pittsburgh does retain contribution rights against Johns-Manville which it may pursue in whatever fashion Pittsburgh deems appropriate.