Case Title: Fulton County Administrator v. James V Sullivan (Rehearing Granted)

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC87-110

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 1999-11-24T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida
____________
No. 87,110
____________
FULTON COUNTY ADMINISTRATOR, as Administrator
of the Estate of Lita McClinton Sullivan,
Petitioner,
vs.
JAMES VINCENT SULLIVAN,
Respondent.
ON REHEARING
[November 24, 1999]
PER CURIAM.
Petitioner's Motion for Rehearing, directed to the opinion issued herein on
September 25, 1997, is granted.  The previous opinion is withdrawn and the
attached revised opinion is substituted as the opinion of the Court in this matter.  No
further motion for rehearing shall be allowed.
We have for review a decision certifying the following question to be of great
public importance:
ARE STATUTES OF LIMITATIONS FOR CIVIL ACTIONS
TOLLED BY THE FRAUDULENT CONCEALMENT OF THE
IDENTITY OF THE DEFENDANT?
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Sullivan v. Fulton County Adm'r, 662 So. 2d 706 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995).  We have
jurisdiction.  Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const.  Based on our finding upon rehearing that
the Georgia statute of limitations applies in this case, we reverse the district court's
decision to the extent that it reversed the judgment against Sullivan.  Accordingly,
we decline to answer the certified question as to Florida law concerning statutes of
limitations.
On January 16, 1987, while respondent James Sullivan and his wife Lita
Sullivan were going through divorce proceedings, Ms. Sullivan was killed in
Atlanta, Georgia.  Throughout the initial police investigation, respondent denied any
involvement in the crime and proposed several alternative theories as to who may
have killed her.  It was not until several years later, in 1990, that respondent
confessed his participation in the crime.  Based on this information, on December
23, 1991, this wrongful death action was filed against respondent in Florida, where
he was a resident.
In answering the complaint, respondent raised the affirmative defense that
Florida's two-year statute of limitations barred this claim.  Petitioner Fulton County
(Georgia) Administrator, as administrator of Ms. Sullivan's estate, argued that
respondent's fraudulent concealment of his participation in the murder tolled the
statutory limitation period.  Twice during the trial, once at the close of the plaintiff's
1In this motion, respondent renewed his earlier motion for directed verdict.
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case and once at the close of all of the evidence,1 respondent moved for a directed
verdict, claiming among other things that the statute of limitations barred the
lawsuit.  The trial court denied both motions.  After a jury trial, the jury awarded
petitioner $3.5 million in compensatory damages and $500,000 in punitive damages. 
Respondent then timely moved for a new trial and four months later moved for relief
from the judgment under Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.540.  The motion for
new trial was based upon a claimed error in failing to enforce the statute of
limitations.  The trial court denied these motions.  However, respondent did not
move to have the verdict set aside and judgment entered in his favor in accordance
with the motion for directed verdict made at the close of all of the evidence as
required by Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.480.
On appeal, the Fourth District reversed the verdict and remanded the cause
for entry of judgment in respondent's favor.  Sullivan, 662 So. 2d at 710.  The
district court found that Florida courts have recognized that fraudulent concealment
of a cause of action will toll the statute of limitations.  Id. at 707.  However, the
court felt constrained to reverse the trial court and follow its own precedent in
International Brotherhood of Carpenters & Joiners of America, Local 1765 v.
United Association of Journeymen & Apprentices, 341 So.2d 1005 (Fla. 4th DCA
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1976), cert. denied, 357 So.2d 186 (Fla. 1978), in which the district court held that
fraudulent concealment of the identity of a tortfeasor does not fit within the
judicially created tolling exception of concealment of a cause of action.  Sullivan,
662 So.2d at 708.  The district court below questioned the propriety of this result in
light of both recent case law from other jurisdictions holding that fraudulent
concealment of one's identity should be treated like fraudulent concealment of a
cause of action and the fairness of protecting a tortfeasor from defending a stale
claim when the tortfeasor is responsible for the delay.  Id. at 708-09.  As well, the
district court concluded that even though fraudulent concealment was included as a
tolling provision only in section 95.11(4)(b), Florida Statutes (1995) (medical
malpractice statute of limitations), the doctrine could broadly apply to other causes
of action.  662 So. 2d at 709-10 (citing Proctor v. Schomberg, 63 So.2d 68
(Fla.1953)).  Given its discomfort with the result, coupled with the fact that this
Court had not yet addressed the issue, the district court certified the foregoing
question, asking us to clarify whether fraudulent concealment of the identity of the
defendant in a civil action will toll the statute of limitations.  Sullivan, 662 So.2d at
710.
LAW AND ANALYSIS
As stated, we decline to answer the certified question because this case is
2Petitioner made this argument in the Fourth District below but did not raise it previously
in this Court because it was outside the scope of the certified question.
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controlled by the Georgia statute of limitations, in which a finding of fraudulent
concealment expressly tolls the statute of limitations for a wrongful death action. 
Ga. Code Ann. § 9-3-96 (1982).  We find that the limitations period in this case is
controlled by our recent decision in Merkle v. Robinson, 737 So. 2d 540 (Fla.
1999).  In Robinson, we answered a certified question and held that the "significant
relationship" test for use in applying section 95.10, Florida Statutes (1997)
(borrowing statute), also applies to the determination of whether to apply Florida's
statute of limitations, section 95.11, Florida Statutes (1997), or the limitations period
of another jurisdiction.  Id. at 543.  In Robinson, this Court disapproved Rodriguez
v. Pacific Scientific Co., 536 So. 2d 270 (Fla. 3d DCA 1988), upon which the
Fourth District Court of Appeal relied in Sullivan for the proposition that the statute
of limitations of the forum state applies except where there is a shorter limitations
period in the state where the tort occurred.  See Sullivan, 662 So. 2d at 707.
Here, petitioner argues on rehearing that under our reasoning in Robinson we
should apply Georgia law in determining whether petitioner is time-barred in this
case by a relevant statute of limitations.2  Under Robinson, we now find that the
Georgia statute of limitations applies because, as the trial court found in this case,
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the circumstances underlying this case have the most significant relationship to the
State of Georgia.  See Bishop v. Florida Specialty Paint Co., 389 So. 2d 999, 1001
(Fla. 1980).  Lita Sullivan, a Georgia resident, was killed in Georgia, and Georgia
police investigated her death.  Moreover, the plaintiffs in this wrongful death action,
Lita Sullivan's parents, are Georgia residents.  Thus, we agree with the trial court
that this action has a significant relationship to the State of Georgia.
In Florida, a cause of action for wrongful death accrues on the date of death,
see St. Francis Hosp. v. Thompson, 159 Fla. 453, 31 So.2d 710 (1947), and has a
two-year statute of limitations period.  See § 95.11(4)(d), Fla. Stat. (1985).  The
Florida statute of limitations, accordingly, began to run in this case on January 16,
1987, the date of Ms. Sullivan's death.  In Georgia, a cause of action for wrongful
death accrues at death and has a two-year limitations period.  See Miles v. Ashland
Chemical Co., 410 S.E. 2d 290 (Ga. 1991).  However, a Georgia statute expressly
tolls the statute of limitations for fraudulent concealment by providing that when a
defendant is guilty of "fraud by which the plaintiff has been debarred or deterred
from bringing an action, the period of limitation shall run only from the time of the
plaintiff's discovery of the fraud."  Ga. Code Ann. § 9-3-96 (1982); see Shipman v.
Horizon Corp., 267 S.E. 2d 244 (Ga. 1980); Brown v. Brown, 75 S.E. 2d 13 (Ga.
1953).
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Thus, the jury's finding of fraudulent concealment in this case tolls Georgia's
two-year statute of limitations for filing a wrongful death action so that the period of
limitation actually began to run from the time of petitioner's discovery of the fraud in
1990.  The filing of the action for wrongful death on December 23, 1991, was
within the statutory limitations period of the State of Georgia.
Respondent contends that even if Florida law dictates that the Georgia statute
of limitations applies under the significant relationship test, petitioner is still bound
by Florida's two-year statute of limitations because under Gray v. Armstrong, 474
S.E. 2d 280 (Ga. Ct. App. 1996), Hunter v. Johnson, 376 S.E. 2d 371 (Ga. 1989),
and Taylor v. Murray, 204 S.E. 2d 747 (Ga. 1974), the Georgia statute of limitations
is considered to be procedural rather than substantive, thereby dictating the use of
the statute of limitations of the law of the forum, which is the state in which the
action is brought.  Thus, respondent argues that this question would be governed by
the statute of limitations of Florida, which is the forum state in this case.
We disagree with respondent's reasoning.  Hunter is distinguishable in that it
does not address a choice of laws issue.  In both Gray and Taylor, Georgia courts
applied Georgia law to reach the conclusion that because a limitations question is
procedural in nature, the Georgia statute of limitations applied to causes of action
filed in other states.  In those cases, Georgia was the forum state and the Georgia
3Given our jurisdiction on the basis of the certified question, we have jurisdiction over all
of the issues raised in this case.  Feller v. State, 637 So.2d 911, 914 (Fla.1994).
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court was treating the Georgia statute of limitations as procedural rather than
substantive law.
Here, however, Florida is the forum state, and this Court determined in
Robinson that statutes of limitations are to be treated as substantive law and thus are
subject to the significant relationship test in determining which state's statute of
limitations applies, not which state's entire body of law applies.  Robinson dictates
that we choose Georgia law only insofar as it includes the Georgia statute of
limitations.  Therefore, we remand to the Fourth District with directions to order that
the judgment against respondent be reinstated.
Finally, we address a procedural issue raised by petitioner.3  Petitioner
contends that the district court could not direct the trial court to enter judgment in
favor of respondent because respondent did not renew his motion for directed
verdict strictly in accord with Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.480.  Petitioner
points to the federal courts' interpretation of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b),
see Johnson v. New York, New Haven & Hartford R.R., 344 U.S. 48 (1952); Cone
v. West Virginia Pulp & Paper Co., 330 U.S. 212 (1947), and argues that we should
follow these decisions and hold that a party who fails to renew a motion for directed
4Justice Frankfurter wrote:
The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are the product of the progress of
centuries from the medieval court-room contest–a thinly disguised version of trial
by combat–to modern litigation.  "Procedure is the means; full, equal and exact
enforcement of substantive law is the end."  Pound, The Etiquette of Justice, 3
Proceedings Neb. St. Bar Assn. 231 (1909).  This basic consideration underlies the
Rules; with it in mind we construed Rule 50(b) in the Montgomery Ward case.
It has been said of the great Baron Parke:  "His fault was an almost
superstitious reverence for the dark technicalities of special pleading, and the
reforms introduced by the Common Law Procedure Acts of 1854 and 1855
occasioned his resignation."  (Sir James Parke, 15 D.N.B. 226).
Baron Parke despaired prematurely.  If he had waited another hundred
years this Court today would have vindicated his belief that judges must be
imprisoned in technicalities of their own devising, that obedience to lifeless
formality is the way to justice. 
Johnson, 344 U.S. at 62 (Frankfurter, J., dissenting).
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verdict and only files a motion for new trial is not entitled to a judgment entered in a
party's favor.  Rather, with the case in such a posture, petitioner argues that an
appellate court may only grant the party a new trial.  We do not agree; instead, we
agree with Justice Frankfurter's dissent in Johnson that such an application of the
rule does not facilitate the proper administration of justice.4
Respondent's motion for new trial was based upon his statutory limitation
defense.  It is correct that technically, in addition to the motion for new trial,
respondent should have filed a motion renewing his earlier motion for directed
verdict in compliance with Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.480.  However, when a
motion for new trial encompasses the same legal basis upon which a motion for
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directed verdict was made during the trial and at the close of all the evidence, our
courts should look to the substance of the motion and rule on the basis of the legal
issue raised in the motion.  Therefore, we reject petitioner's claim that the district
court, after reversing the final judgment, was powerless to direct the entry of
judgment in respondent's favor.
Accordingly, we reverse the district court's decision to the extent that it
reversed the judgment against respondent.  We remand for proceedings consistent
with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
HARDING, C.J., SHAW, WELLS, and ANSTEAD, JJ., and OVERTON, Senior
Justice, concur.
KOGAN, Senior Justice, dissents.
Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal - Certified
Great Public Importance
Fourth District - Case No. 94-2137
(Palm Beach County)
Richard A. Kupfer, John B. Moores and David W. Boone of Richard A. Kupfer,
P.A., West Palm Beach, Florida, 
for Petitioner
Randall Nordlund and Joseph E. Altschul of Gilbride, Heller & Brown, P.A.,
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Miami, Florida,
for Respondent
Roy D. Wasson, Miami, Florida,
for Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers, 
Amicus Curiae