Michael Butler v. Larry Norris

394 F. App'x 326

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
• Decided: September 16, 2010
• Docket: 10-1672
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

PER CURIAM.

Arkansas inmate Michael Lewis Butler filed a 42 U.S.C. § 1988 complaint against several Arkansas Department of Correction employees. In September 2009, Butler’s counsel informed the district court 1 that the parties had entered into a settlement agreement, and counsel requested the action be dismissed with prejudice. The court then ordered the complaint dismissed on September 14, but it did not enter judgment and retained jurisdiction for thirty days to vacate its order if a party showed that the settlement had not been completed. In October, Butler moved through counsel to vacate the dismissal order and to reopen the case. In November, Butler filed a separate pro se motion to vacate, arguing that the written settlement agreement did not reflect certain verbal assurances made by defendants. In January 2010, the district court denied the pending motions to vacate upon concluding that the parties had settled, and entered judgment dismissing the action with prejudice. Butler appeals.

We conclude that the district court did not clearly err in concluding that the parties had settled. See Chaganti & Assocs., P.C. v. Nowotny, 470 F.3d 1215, 1221 (8th Cir.2006) (standard of review; basic principles of contract law govern existence and enforcement of alleged settlement); see also Worthy v. McKesson Corp., 756 F.2d 1370, 1373 (8th Cir.1985) (per curiam) (parties to voluntary settlement agreement cannot avoid agreement simply because agreement ultimately proves to be disadvantageous). Accordingly, we affirm the judgment. See 8th Cir. R. 47B.

1 . The Honorable Brian S. Miller, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas, adopting the report and recommendations of the Honorable Henry L. Jones, Jr., United States Magistrate Judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas.