american general life insurance company morning may please the court i'm robert pritzker from say i'm hoping my briefs successfully addressed statutes of limitation tolling issues before you so if i may in my few minutes i'd like only to comment on something that i find extremely perplexing that is that the suggestion by the court below and defendant that defendant problem if he invests in that fund it was even said that i was buying a ford everyone knows of ford so you're on your own mister i note ford has one heck of a warranty but apparently defend it need have not not only is it understood in the variable annuity world and have books been written on the subject that insurers perform extensive due diligence on phones they wish to sponsor for investment but that has to be the case because the i r s given its investor control doctrine that then justifies tax deferral accrual of gains on a variable annuity prohibits variable annuity contract oldies from contacting the sponsored funds in an attempt to learn more about those funds affairs indeed the closing sentence of every defendant every covering letter accompanying a funs letter to me warns in bold faced and is underlined please do not contact the fun directly if the pivotal critical and minimum guidelines that defend for fraud for funds admission and retention on its platform is not emblematic of a considerable duty that was owed to me what could possibly explain defends establishing those threshold that's frightening could it be that defendants ignoring s s r is gross deficiencies in meeting its criteria and minimum guidelines was excusable neglect of defendant's duty to me as with rule twenty five for registered securities and given that as you see v variable in annuity life insurance company held variable annuities to be securities since defendant repeatedly told me it had performed thorough due diligence on s s r before i invested and that was a misstatement to defendant not have a subsequent duty as opposed to its silence to speak in order to make the statement not misleading it seems to me the seventy five year old unsophisticated investor retiree who had a plan to leave his wife and twenty year old twin boys yes no my grandchildren his life savings that the nature of defense duty to me was far far more than just to be a pass through for my investments and collect one hundred thousand dollars in fees as middleman juggernaut a i g's superior reputation at least in january two thousand and eight when i invested exclusively situated position to perform due diligence superior knowledge and control over the funds is hundred percent wholly owned insurance choose to sponsor a signal to me i could very comfortably rely on defendants having done its to diligence not only do the connecticut insurance department regulations and bulletins articulate a fiduciary duty owed to retirees who invest in variable annuit but the many cases i've read would seem to conclude that defendant owed me nothing less than that for the sherry duty thanks for allowing me to reflect on the duties i believe were extent between myself and defendant  think you made weeks ago and i'm jason richardson for the apple leverage and general life insurance company we're asking the court to affirm the district court's decision to dismiss mr pritzker as case on the basis of a rule twelve b six  motion that we filed and let me put it this way your honor this is a statute of limitations case and there's really only two facts that are necessary to put out there for the court to make a resolution on these issues what are the date what over seven years later on may fourth two thousand and fifteen the longest statute of limitations that's a book about in this case is six years and again the time the last year is seven years it's it's worth noting that the particular limitation statutes are as applied are actually statutes of repose and that's important because it means that delayed discovery or late discovery by the plaintiff on the rule of his causes of action won't extend the period for him to file those claims but we don't actually need to go there because maybe let me put it this way it's often said in industry that variable annuit offers you an opportunity to invest in a hedge fund fund of funds i can have one of those please unheard of but that's what happened here mr pritzker and of prior investment advisor identified a very specific type of investment came to my client asked for an application for it my client wouldn't sell it to him unless he felt he engaged his own independent investment advisor finra licensed enough securities broker dealer who had to sign off on the application first and when commercial relationship commercial transaction between an insurer and a customer you know the the cases that have come up in the briefs that talk about when a connecticut court might find a fiduciary relationship to exist i call it the maybe the wallet rule in each of those instances essentially the customer the investor essentially hands their wallet over to the defendant and says do with it what you will i trust you you can invest the money  needed for for my benefit and you know that forms the basis of the fiduciary relationship here there's not a single example whether it's a lesser or more in the documents attached to the pleadings that shows american general at any step  way ever exercised an iota of discretion over mr pritzker sic you know he applied for the unity he selected the investments he selected the amount of money to be invested and was you know given all the information about his investments to which she wasn't titled not once did american general step into the shoes of mr pritzker to make any decision or distribute any of his funds or otherwise you know make an investment decision to show if you share a relationship exists and that's important absent a fiduciary relationship between the parties neither of the two tolling doctrines can be a political here you can't have a continuing course of conduct only argument because after the date of purchase and mr pritzker allegation is that we should have come forward after the purchase date and warned him that something was amiss or to provide him voluntarily with some sort of investment advice absent fiduciary duty americans general american general silence can be used against it in furtherance of a continuing course of conduct allegation fraudulent concealment same thing if the basis of the of the argument is is silence there has to be a fiduciary duty present otherwise there's no duty to speak there can't be a fraudulent intent to conceal based on please so what that leaves us with is the relationship is governed by the terms of the contract that the parties have the respond to anything councils well i wrote myself silly in the papers i submitted and if i haven't beaten down all the arguments you made i can't pull it off in another fifty