Business Law 13th Edition by Frank Cross, Kenneth Clarkson, Roger LeRoy Miller

Exercise 8

Mutual Mistake. When Steven Simkin divorced Laura Blank, they agreed to split their assets equally. They owned an account with Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities estimated to be worth $5.4 million. Simkin kept the account and paid Blank more than $6.5 million- including $2.7 million to offset the amount of the funds that they believed were in the account. Later, they learned that the account actually contained no funds due to its manager's fraud. Could their agreement be rescinded on the basis of a mistake? Discuss. [Simkin v. Blank, 80 A.D.3d 401, 915 N.Y.S.2d 47 (1 Dept. 2011)] (See page 291.)