Dismissal of Suit Does Not Affect Comparative Fault
Tennessee follows a comparative fault approach to negligence claims. What this means is that when a plaintiff brings suit against a defendant alleging that the defendant’s negligence has caused some sort of harm to plaintiff, the court will first determine the amount of damages, if any, that the plaintiff should be awarded. Once this is done, the court will figure out which parties are responsible for the damages (including the plaintiff and unnamed parties to the suit) and what percentage of the damages each party is responsible for in order to figure out what percentage of the total damages the defendant(s) in the suit should pay. For example, if A sues B and the court determines that each party is one-half responsible for the damages suffered by A, then B will be ordered to pay half of the total damages. However, if A sued B, but the court found that A, B, and C (a third party not named in the suit) were each one-third responsible, then B would only have to pay one-third of the damages even though C was not named in the suit. This is so because the comparative fault approach focuses on each party’s responsibility for the damages caused in order to fairly impose liability for damages.
A recent decision by the Tennessee Court of Appeals illustrates the workings of the comparative fault approach. A mother recently sued six different parties after her seven year-old son was struck and killed by a truck owned by a company named Misek while crossing the street. Prior to the hearing of her case against the City of Clinton, the mother had settled and dismissed her suit against Misek and several other defendants had either reached settlement with the mother or had their cases dismissed as well. At trial, the City of Clinton relied in part on the affirmative defense of comparative fault, maintaining that the mother and the other parties involved in the accident also had some liability for any damages suffered by the mother. Since there were only two parties to the suit, the trial court found that each party was 50% responsible for the damages and ordered the City of Clinton to pay half of the total damages sustained by the mother, with the mother herself being responsible for the other half.
On appeal, the City of Clinton maintained that the apportioning of fault by the trial court was erroneous because there was evidence on the record proving that Misek bore some level of responsibility for the death of the child. The Tennessee Court of Appeals agreed. The court held that Misek’s driver knew of the presence of children in the area and failed to keep a reasonable lookout for them, thus making the company responsible in part for the child’s death. The fact that Misek had already settled with the mother did nothing to affect Misek’s level of responsibility for the damages caused under the comparative fault approach. Misek had already settled its suit, so it would not have to pay any further damages for the truck accident in Tennessee, but it would still bear the same percentage of responsibility for the accident in question for purposes of determining fault in the suit currently being tried. The Court of Appeals thus reversed the judgment of the trial court with an order to determine the percentage of fault for all parties involved in the accident, not just those who were currently involved in litigation with the mother.
This case demonstrates the concept that an unnamed party to a suit will still be apportioned fault for an accident even though it has long since settled its case with the plaintiff. If there is evidence on the record demonstrating that the unnamed party is somewhat at fault for the accident, the unnamed party must be apportioned the proper amount of fault for its role in causing the damages. This will have virtually no practical effect on the unnamed party that has already settled a suit, but helps to ensure that the defendant and plaintiff are fairly apportioned fault for any role they may have had in the incident giving rise to the damages. This practice also ensures that a plaintiff cannot recover excess damages by suing several plaintiffs separately for the same incident and recovering from each of them on a 50 / 50 basis. More often than not, any liability apportioned to an unnamed party will act to reduce the liability apportioned to the defendant(s) in the suit, making sure defendants are not penalized for damages in excess of those for which they should be held responsible. The practice of apportioning fault in Tennessee to all parties to the incident, not just those named in the lawsuit being tried, helps to fairly distribute the responsibility for loss among all culpable parties and prevents parties to the lawsuit from being unjustly penalized or enriched.
Sources: Russell v. Anderson County, 34 TAM 39-7, 9/8/09, ES, Franks, 5 pages
