Gleason v. Guzman

623 P.2d 378 (1981)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Benavidez, then a fourteen-year-old minor, was struck on the head by a vending machine that fell from a truck operated by D in the course of his employment with Coin Fresh, Inc. (Ds). Darlene has married and is now known as Darlene Guzman (P). P was taken to Denver General Hospital for examination. She complained of headache, vomiting and some disorientation and, after two days of observation and testing, her injury was diagnosed as a left temporal lobe contusion, and she was released as improved. On October 13, 1970, P was readmitted to the hospital with complaints similar to those previously experienced. Further testing resulted in a diagnosis of left intratemporal lobe hematoma, and P was discharged as improved on October 20, 1970. P returned to high school and a normal routine. It was believed that P had fully recovered from the injury. Approximately two years later an attorney initiated settlement negotiations with Ds' insurance carrier. It was mutually agreed that the case be settled for $6,114.35. The probate court approved the settlement and Mr. Benavidez, as duly appointed guardian, executed a general release of his daughter's claim against Ds. Forty-four months after the accident, P experienced her first epileptic seizure during her senior year in high school. Other seizures followed. A complaint was filed in November 1975 for money damages against Ds in the accident of September 29, 1970. Ds defended with the execution of the prior settlement and filed a motion for summary judgment on the basis of the guardian's release. P motioned to set aside the release on the ground that it was executed under a mistake as to the nature of the injury actually sustained. P presented a neurologist who testified that the first diagnosis of post-traumatic epilepsy was made after the first seizure in 1974 and that a monitored program of intermittent electroencephalographic testing between the accident and the seizure would not have necessarily disclosed the epileptic condition. Ds' motion for summary judgment was granted. Any mistake existing at the time the release was executed was not a mutual mistake of fact, but rather a unilateral mistake of prognosis by P. P should have known that traumatic epilepsy could result from her injury. The court of appeals reversed: there was evidence upon which the trier of fact could well conclude that the settlement was based on a basic mistake. Ds appealed contending that Ps only mistake was about future complications and the release covered both known and unknown conditions.