Spring 2004
LITIGATION
YOU’VE WAITED
LONG ENOUGH: YOU’RE TIME-BARRED
As most of us know, the California Legislature enacted Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1, which became effective on January 1, 2003, extending the statute of limitations for personal injury actions from one to two years. However, the statute was silent on the issue of retroactivity. Litigants questioned whether section 335.1 could be applied retroactively. In other words, if a person sustained a personal injury on, for example, January 26, 2001, would the new two-year period operate to extend the statute of limitations until January 26, 2003? According to the Court of Appeal, the answer is “no.”
In Krupnick v. Duke Energy Morro Bay, L.L.C. (2004) 115 Cal.App. 4th 1026, plaintiff alleged that on January 26, 2001, he slipped and fell while on defendant’s premises. However, he did not file his complaint for personal injuries until January 8, 2003, well after the one-year statute of limitations which applied at the time of his fall had expired. As such, defendant filed a demurrer and contended that plaintiff’s action was time-barred.
Plaintiff argued that the newly-enacted two-year statute of limitations applied to his complaint, thereby allowing for the action to be filed at any time prior to January 26, 2003. The trial court disagreed and granted defendant’s demurrer. Plaintiff appealed.
The Court of Appeal agreed with defendant and ruled that the California Legislature did not intend for section 335.1 to be applied retroactively. In reaching its decision, the appellate court stated: “Our primary aim in construing any law is to determine the legislative intent. In doing so we look first to the words of the statute, giving them their usual and ordinary meaning.” (Krupnick at p. 1028) Code of Civil Procedure 335.1 provides, “Within two years: An action for assault, battery, or injury to, or for the death of, an individual caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another.”
The court noted the language of section 335.1 does not expressly provide that it applies retroactively to claims already time-barred under the former statute. Because the new law was silent as to retroactivity, the court noted that legislative intent can be ascertained by looking to other statutes that were enacted contemporaneously with section 335.1. More specifically, the court looked to Code of Civil Procedure section 340.10, which expressly called for retroactivity regarding claims brought by September 11 victims. Thus, the appellate court opined “the Legislature singled out only one class of plaintiffs — 9/11 terrorist victims — as entitled to retroactive application of Section 335.1.” (Krupnick at p. 1029)
Supporting the conclusion that the Legislature did not intend section 335.1 to apply retroactively to persons other than terrorist attack victims, the court also recited several statutory canons of construction. First, “an enlargement of limitations operates prospectively unless the statute expressly provides otherwise.” The rationale for this rule of statutory construction is based on the “judicial perception of unfairness in reviving a cause [of action] after the prospective defendant has assumed that the cause of action has expired and has conducted his affairs accordingly.”
The Court of Appeal also referred to that familiar rule of construction: expressio uninus est esclusio alterius. This rule of construction holds that where exceptions to a general rule are specified by statute, other exceptions are not to be implied or presumed. As such, simply because the Legislature specified an exception under section 340.10 for terrorist victims, it does not follow that other exceptions should be implied or presumed.
The court turned to a final rule of statutory construction that “significance must be given to every word in pursuing the legislative purpose, and the court should avoid a construction that makes some words surplusage.” Should section 335.1 be construed to apply retroactively to all tort victims, section 340.10, which expressly provides for retroactive application of section 335.1 to terrorist victims, would be reduced to mere surplusage. Supporting this conclusion, the court referred to a bill analysis prepared by the staff of the Assembly Committee on Judiciary which stated this bill extended the statute of limitations period to these victims. Thus, the court reasoned, if the Legislature intended section 335.1 to apply retroactively to all tort victims, the Legislature would have said so, just like it did in the contemporaneously-enacted section 340.10.
It should be noted that case law remains unsettled as to whether a complaint based on personal injuries sustained within a year of January 1, 2003, is subject to the one-year or the two-year statute of limitations. In other words, would a complaint based on personal injuries sustained on December 31, 2002, be subject to the old one-year or the new two-year statute of limitations? It would appear that all of the reasons stated by the court in Krupnick would be equally applicable to this fact pattern. Accordingly, the one-year statute of limitations would apply. Stay tuned.
Gregory L. Torres
Mr. Torres is an Associate in the firm’s litigation group. Email: glt@kpclegal.com.
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