(Internal quotation marks and citation omitted.) In Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods. Co., 99 N.M. 22, 27, 653 P.2d 522, 527 (Ct. App. 1982), this Court quoted the foregoing passage from Harrison and held that, with the release of an agent, the means by which liability can be imputed to the principal is destroyed. The rationale for this ruling was that the Uniform Contribution Act did not apply to defendants sued under vicarious liability theories because vicarious liability is a legal fiction imputing the wrongdoing of an agent to the principal.

Some cases under the Uniform Act are contrary. In Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Products Co., 99 N.M. 22, 653 P.2d 522 (Ct.App. 1982), the court held that a partner, who was vicariously liable for the tort of a partnership, was released from liability when the partnership was released. Id. at 27, 653 P.2d at 527.

See Hammonds, 559 S.W.2d at 347 (barring partners from bringing subsequent suit against defendant where the partnership's suit against the same defendant was dismissed with prejudice); Corsicana Ready Mix v. Trinity Metroplex Div., 559 S.W.2d 423 (Tex.Civ.App. 1977) (holding that "the answers of all individual partners is equivalent to an answer for the partnership"). In Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods., Co., 99 N.M. 22, 653 P.2d 522 (Ct.App. 1982), the Court of Appeals of New Mexico addressed the precise issue of the effect of the release of a partnership on the vicarious liability of its partners under New Mexico's uniform partnership act. N.M.Stat.Ann. §§ 54-1-1 et seq. (Michie 1978). In that case, the suit in which the partnership was released from liability was for acts and omissions of the partnership:

Its true basis is largely one of public or social policy under which it has been determined that, irrespective of fault, a party should be held to respond for the acts of another. Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods. Co., 99 N.M. 22, 653 P.2d 522, 527 (Ct.App. 1982) (citations omitted). Under the principles of agency and respondeat superior, vicarious liability may be imposed on a principal or employer for the acts of an agent or employee.

Vicarious liability, by contrast, is “indirect legal responsibility.” Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods. Co., 653 P.2d 522, 527 (N.M. Ct. App. 1982).

Doc. 6 at 8. New Mexico law defines vicarious liability as “indirect legal responsibility,” which “is based on a relationship between the parties.” Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods. Co., 1982-NMCA-160, ¶ 29, 99 N.M. 22, 653 P.2d 522.

For the same reasons, the cases presented by Defendants in their opening brief—which hold that an agent's release from liability removes the basis on which the principal's fault is imputed—are not factually analogous. See, e.g.,Valdez v. R-Way, LLC , 148 N.M. 477, 237 P.3d 1289, 1292-93 (2010) ; Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prod. Co. , 99 N.M. 22, 653 P.2d 522, 527 (1982) (affirming directed verdict where directly liable parties were dismissed, because dismissal of directly liable entity "destroyed" the "means by which liability was imputed" to the vicariously liable party). The query in those cases was whether the agents’ dismissal mandated the dismissal of the vicariously liable party but there was no need to consider a completely different second vicariously liable party, as there is here.

New Mexico law defines vicarious liability as "indirect legal responsibility." Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Prods. Co., 653 P.2d 522, 527 (N.M.App. 1982). In this case, no direct legal responsibility exists because Defendants are entitled to dismissal of all the state law claims asserted against the individual officers.

Nonetheless, because the government's liability in such a case is derivative, dismissal of the underlying claim against the employee will also release the employer. See Kinetics, Inc. v. El Paso Products Co., 99 N.M. 22, 27, 653 P.2d 522, 527 (N.M.Ct.App. 1982). This standard, however, is complicated by the New Mexico Court of Appeals' decision in Baer v. Regents of University of California, 118 N.M. 685, 884 P.2d 841 (N.M.Ct.App. 1994).

Where there is no primary liability, there can be no secondary, or derivative, liability. See Kinetics v. El Paso Products Co., 99 N.M. 22, 27, 653 P.2d 522, 527 (Ct.App. 1982). This Court has already determined that the Farmington Officers are immune from suit under the NMTCA for Plaintiff Torrez's claims of interference with prospective business advantage, false light invasion of privacy, and IIED.