Section 3.17 Calculating the Effect of Settlement

• Library: Settling Cases 2014

Before Gustafson v. Benda, 661 S.W.2d 11 (Mo. banc 1983), the effect of a settlement on an injured party’s recovery from the remaining parties was fairly easy to calculate. Both before and after 1983, a plaintiff’s judgment against the nonsettling tortfeasors would be reduced by the amount of any partial settlement. See §3.6, supra.

A new problem was added with comparative fault: When is the injured party’s comparative fault deducted from the judgment—before or after deducting the amount of any pretrial settlements? The answer to this question involved far more than a mere academic exercise, as Jensen v. ARA Services, Inc., 736 S.W.2d 374 (Mo. banc 1987), demonstrates.

In Jensen, 736 S.W.2d 374, the plaintiff’s husband was killed in an accident...