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Davila v. Nickell10/26/2005
bstantially promoted the good faith settlement statutory objectives.
First, despite that the settlement occurred after the verdict in the main case, the good faith determination encouraged Kuiper to settle and eliminated the need for a trial on Kuiper's liability to the plaintiffs. The Louies' argument that the settlement was unnecessary because Kuiper could no longer be "prosecuted" by plaintiffs and/or that "Kuiper's liability to the plaintiffs . . . never going to be determined in this case" is not supported by the record. The fact that Barraza had a weak case against Kuiper does not mean that a trial would have been legally foreclosed. In this regard, this case is distinguishable from Be, where the plaintiffs' claims against the named defendants had been fully litigated. (Be, supra, 55 Cal.App.4th at p. 1144.)
Second, the settlement permitted the equitable allocation of costs among multiple tortfeasors. Although Barraza had already obtained a large damage verdict against the co-defendants, the issue of the collectability of this judgment was in substantial doubt. Thus, Barraza had a strong incentive to obtain a high settlement amount from Kuiper. Additionally, given the extraordinarily large monetary verdict against the co-defendants, Kuiper had an equally strong incentive to settle at a substantial amount to avoid any risk of a similar verdict. Defendants received a substantial credit, in the form of a $500,000 offset to the judgment, despite the minimal role Kuiper played in the events that led to plaintiffs' injuries. Defendants received this credit despite their recognition of the "legal absurdity of Barraza's claim that Kuiper's failure to procure insurance caused Barraza to fall off a roof." In other words, under the procedural context of this case, the settlement was more than fair to the Louies because Kuiper settled for much more than his fair share even under the Louies' view of the case.
Although the Louies acknowledge that the $500,000 is fair when viewing Kuiper's potential liability to the plaintiffs, they argue the amount is too low when viewing Kuiper's legal responsibility to the Louies. They argue their "$12 million liability to plaintiffs" arises only because Kuiper "negligently certified that worker's compensation insurance existed," i.e., if they had been told there was no workers' compensation coverage they would not have retained Joadd as the general contractor and/or would have obtained the necessary insurance. They therefore argue that the good faith settlement determination was unfair to them because their damages (the $12 million verdict) flowed directly from Kuiper's breach of a duty to them.
This argument is based on a faulty premise-that these claimed monetary damages are the subject of the good faith settlement statutes. A good faith settlement bars claims against the settling tortfeasor only to the extent the claim seeks indemnity or contribution for damages owed to the plaintiff for the same harm. (See Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co. v. Superior Court (1994) 29 Cal.App.4th 435, 441.) "Section 877.6 shows, on its face, that its protective cloak is limited. It bars only those claims by one joint tortfeasor against the settling tortfeasor for equitable comparative contribution based on comparative negligence or comparative fault." (Id. at p. 439, italics added.) Thus, "the focus of the statutory scheme is on settlements by a plaintiff with one of several parties alleged to be jointly liable for the same tortious injury." (Id. at p. 441, italics added; see also Carr v. Cove (1973) 33 Cal.App.3d 851, 854.)
Under these principles, the good faith settlement bars the Louies from shifting any of plaintiffs' monetary damag
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