Wilshire Ins. Co. v. Tuff Boy Holding, Inc.

Following entry of judgment in favor of defendant Tuff Boy Holding, Inc. (hereafter Tuff Boy) and against plaintiff Wilshire Insurance Company (hereafter Wilshire) on a claim for indemnity, Wilshire appeals from the judgment, challenging the trial court’s prejudgment grant of a motion for good faith settlement between Tuff Boy and the plaintiffs in an underlying tort action, which was consolidated with this indemnity suit. Wilshire contends the good faith settlement procedures of Code of Civil Procedure section 877.6 do not apply under the circumstances of this case and, if they do apply, the settlement in this case was not entered in good faith. Tuff Boy argues, among other matters, that Wilshire’s appeal must be dismissed because writ review is the exclusive means of reviewing a good faith settlement determination. In the published portion of the opinion, we shall conclude the section 877.6 determination is reviewable on appeal from the judgment, because Wilshire had earlier filed a timely writ petition in this court. We shall further conclude the trial court properly applied section 877.6 to this case, even though there were no nonsettling defendants in the case when…