Court Opinion

ID: 9483041
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:08:32.979187+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:22.414307
License: Public Domain

WELLFORD, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Because I agree with the district court’s analysis and conclusion in this case, I respectfully dissent.
The plaintiffs have been investing in Texas and Kansas oil since at the 1970’s. At all times pertinent to this appeal, they were represented by competent counsel. As the district court noted, this “is not a case where the Bank took advantage of an unsophisticated debtor.”
As the majority explained, the parties in this action have a long and involved financial history. Their relationship began when the Bank loaned the plaintiffs money to invest in oil. When the parties realized that the plaintiffs could not meet their loan obligations, they entered into a plan whereby the plaintiffs could satisfy their debt through the proceeds of a farm, which had been posted as collateral for the debt. The farm fortuitously sold at a generous price, and the debt was fully satisfied. At the conclusion of the deal, the parties signed a mutual release, which release protected both the plaintiffs and the Bank from any further claims “in any way relating to or connected with the Loan made by the Bank to the [plaintiffs].”
In my view, the mutual release signed by the parties was unambiguous, and by its clear language it bars the plaintiffs’ suit below. Although it is true that the intention of the parties governs a release, the scope of “that intent is to be determined from the language of the release. The intention of the parties to a release or its legal effect as evidenced by its language cannot be contradicted or varied by parol or extrinsic evidence.” State ex rel. Stutz v. Campbell, 602 S.W.2d 874, 876 (Mo.Ct.App. 1980) (citations omitted). The majority finds ambiguity in the language of the release because of certain extrinsic documents, e.g., the Agreement Respecting Indebtedness and 1988 correspondence between the plaintiffs and the Bank. It does not purport to find ambiguity in the language of the release itself. In actuality, the broad, plain language of the release prevents claims that in any way relate to the loan transaction at issue. The parties agree that the Pride Pipeline checks represent proceeds that originally secured the Bank’s loan.
The question in this case is not whether the Bank is entitled to the checks. Rather, the issue is whether the mutual release bars this action by the plaintiffs. The majority suggests that the release did not cover this action because neither party knew of the existence of the Pride Pipeline checks at the time the release was signed, and that the parties may not have anticipated this situation. But as the district court stated, “[t]he possibility that all lease income was not accounted for can fairly be said to [have been] within the contemplation of the parties. Both parties to a release take a risk that future events will weigh in favor of the other party. By entering a release, the parties accept that risk for the security of repose.”
The majority also concludes that the parties may have contemplated that pre-1987 transactions were not covered by the release. In my view, however, if the parties had intended to limit the release to transactions made in a certain time frame, the release would have so stated. “To the contrary, the release bars ‘any and all ... claims ... whatsoever ... in anyway relating to or connected to’ the loan.” I believe that the Bank’s acceptance of the Pride Pipeline checks was clearly related to and connected to the loan transaction, and that any action thereon is barred by the mutual *440release, which was signed after advice of counsel.1

. These plaintiffs may wish to pursue action against Pride Pipeline for holding their checks for so long without giving any notification. Nevertheless, a cause of action cannot proceed against the defendant Bank.