Shortt v. Hudson Supply & Equipment Co.

• Decision Date: 06 September 1950
• Docket Number: No. 3673,3673
• Citation: 191 Va. 306,60 S.E.2d 900
• Parties: RAYMOND P. SHORTT v. HUDSON SUPPLY AND EQUIPMENT COMPANY, A CORPORATION, AND JIMMIE MORGAN, ADMINISTRATOR OF THE ESTATE OF NATUS MORGAN, DECEASED. Record
• Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Page 900

60 S.E.2d 900

191 Va. 306

RAYMOND P. SHORTT v. HUDSON SUPPLY AND EQUIPMENT COMPANY, A CORPORATION, AND JIMMIE MORGAN, ADMINISTRATOR OF THE ESTATE OF NATUS MORGAN, DECEASED.

Record No. 3673.

Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia

September 6, 1950.

Fielding L. Wilson and H. H. Watson, for the plaintiff in error.

Robert Lewis Young, John G. May, Jr., and Charles H. Wilson, for the defendants in error.

JUDGE: EGGLESTON

EGGLESTON, J., delivered the opinion of the court.

Raymond P. Shortt filed his notice of motion for judgment in the court below against Hudson Supply and Equipment Company, a corporation, and Jimmie Morgan, administrator of the estate of Natus Morgan, deceased, seeking to recover $15,000 damages for injuries sustained on August 16, 1947, as the result of a collision at a grade crossing near Wellville, in Nottoway county, between a passenger train operated by the Norfolk and Western Railway Company, on which the plaintiff, Shortt, was employed as a fireman, and a tractor and trailer owned by Hudson Supply and Equipment Company and operated by its employee, Natus Morgan.

The notice alleged that the collision was proximately due to the negligence of Morgan, the driver of the tractor and trailer, in driving over the crossing in front of the engine, and that as the result of the collision the cargo of gasoline which was being carried on the tractor and trailer caught on fire, severely burning and injuring the plaintiff.

The defendants filed a special plea in bar, alleging that after the collision and before the commencement of the present action, namely on July 1, 1948, 'the said plaintiff by his certain writing of release or covenant not to sue, signed with his hand and sealed with his seal, and now to the court shown, the day of execution thereof being the day, month and year aforesaid, did compromise his alleged claim in the notice of motion for judgment herein mentioned and in full satisfaction thereof did accept from the Norfolk and Western Railway Company the sum of Thirty-Five Hundred ($3,500.00) Dollars and in consideration thereof did release the said Norfolk and Western Railway Company and covenant not to sue the said Norfolk and Western Railway Company on account of the aforesaid alleged claim.'

The plaintiff filed a motion to strike the plea and a replication thereto. By consent of the parties the matter was heard by the trial court without a jury. So far as the record shows the only evidence offered on either side was the following written instrument which had been executed by the plaintiff:

'For the sole consideration of THREE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS ($3,500.00), receipt of which is hereby acknowledged, the undersigned covenants that he will not commence or prosecute any action or suit against the Norfolk and Western Railway Company or any of its officers or employees for damages or expenses on account of personal injuries or loss or damage to property growing directly or indirectly out of a crossing collision which occurred on or about August 16, 1947, at or near Wellville, Virginia, and will refrain from commencing or prosecuting any acting or suit against said Norfolk and Western Railway Company or any action or suit against said Norfolk and Western Railway Company or any of its officers or employees on account thereof.

'It is expressly understood that this instrument is merely a covenant not to sue and not a release. The undersigned expressly reserves the right to an action or actions, suit or suits against Hudson Supply & Equipment Co., its officers and employees, and the personal representative of Natus Morgan, deceased, for damages or expenses growing directly or indirectly out of said crossing collision.

'Witness my hand and seal this 1st day of July, 1948. Witnesses:

'Raymond P. Shortt (Seal)'

Upon consideration of these matters the trial court held, in a brief written opinion, that the instrument which the plaintiff had signed, sealed and delivered to the Norfolk and Western Railway Company, in consideration of the payment by it to him of the sum of $3,500, was, in effect, a release by him of the Railway Company as a joint tort-feasor, and that it had the effect of barring or discharging the plaintiff's claims against the defendants, Hudson Supply and Equipment Company and Morgan's administrator. Accordingly, it entered an order sustaining the sufficiency of the plea and giving judgment thereon in favor of the defendants. To review that judgment the present writ has been allowed. For convenience we shall refer to the parties according to the positions which they occupied in the lower court.

The plaintiff first argues that the principle invoked by the trial court is inapplicable, because, he says, there is no showing in the present record that the Norfolk and Western Railway Company and the owner and operator of the tractor and trailer were joint tort-feasors, or, indeed, that the Railway Company was guilty of any wrongdoing in causing his (the plaintiff's) injuries.

While the record now before us does not disclose the nature of the plaintiff's claim against the Railway Company, it does show that his present suit and the settlement which he made with that company arose out of the same collision. Having settled with the Railway Company, he is estopped to deny that he had no claim against it. Harris v. Roanoke, 179 Va. 1, 5, 6, 18 S.E. (2d) 303, 305; Cooley on Torts, 4th Ed., Vol. 1, sec. 83, pp. 264, 265; 1 Am. Jur., Accord and Satisfaction, sec. 73, pp. 257, 258.

Moreover, since the plaintiff had but a single claim, -- an indivisible cause of action for damages for his personal injuries arising out of the collision, -- in determining whether he has received satisfaction therefor and has released one of those responsible for the damage, it is immaterial whether those guilty of the wrongdoing were, strictly speaking, joint tort-feasors. Restatement of the Law, Torts, Vol. 4, sec. 885, p. 462; Williston on Contracts, Rev. Ed., Vol. 2, sec. 338A, p. 998.

By the great weight of authority a covenant not to sue one joint tort-feasor, as distinguished from a release, does not operate to discharge the covenantor's claim against other joint tort-feasors. Restatement of the Law, Torts, Vol. 4, sec. 885, pp. 460-462; Williston on Contracts, Rev. Ed., Vol. 2, sec. 338A, p. 994 ff; 45 Am. Jur., Release, sec. 4, pp. 676, 677. Some authorities base this distinction upon the principle that a release is an immediate relinquishment or discharge of the covenantor's right of action, whereas a covenant not to sue is merely a promise not to prosecute a suit against the covenantee, and is enforceable only by the latter. 45 Am. Jur., Release, sec. 4, 1949 Supp., p. 15.

Other writers criticize such a distinction as being artificial and technical. They say that a covenant not to sue one joint tort-feasor does not release others, because such result is not within the intent of the parties as evidenced by the instrument. Restatement of the Law, Torts, supra; Williston on Contracts, supra.

Those who follow the latter reasoning go farther and hold that a release of one of several tort-feasors, with an express reservation of rights against the others, does not operate as a discharge of the releasor's claims against all of such wrongdoers, because such a result is contrary to the intent of the instrument. Consequently, these authorities say, such a qualified release operates merely as a covenant not to sue the person released. See Williston on Contracts, Rev. Ed., Vol. 2, sec. 338A, p. 995; 45 Am. Jur., Release, sec. 37, p. 702.

In Virginia, we have adhered to the strict common-law view of the effect of an accord and satisfaction with, and the release of, one joint tort-feasor as affecting the rights and liabilities of others liable for the same injury.

In the early case of Ruble v. Turner, 2 Hen. & M. (12 Va.) 38, we held that a release of, or an accord and satisfaction with, one of several persons guilty of a joint assault and battery, is a bar to an action as to all of...