Source: https://govlawweb.typepad.com/government_liability_upda/statute-of-limitations/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 00:17:36+00:00

Document:
In Soto v. Unknown Sweetman, published February 9, 2018, a divided 9th Circuit panel affirmed a district court's grant of summary judgment to the defendants in a pro se prisoner's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 action against several prison guards. The plaintiff alleged that in 2010 he was beaten by the defendant guards. He did not file suit until 2014. The defendants sought summary judgment based on the two-year statute of limitations. The plaintiff argued that his exhaustion of the state law administrative remedies delayed accrual of his cause of action until exhaustion was complete, since the Prison Litigation Reform Act requires exhaustion before a federal lawsuit is brought. He alternatively argued that exhaustion equitably tolled his time to sue. The district court rejected both arguments.
The 9th Circuit panel unanimously held that the PRLA's exhaustion requirement does not affect the date of accrual of a pro se prisoner's cause of action. The policies served by statutes of limitation are not furthered by delaying the start of the time to sue until exhaustion. The court held that unfairness when the exhaustion period exceeds the statute of limitations is best served by equitably tolling the limitations period during exhaustion.
The majority also held, however, that the plaintiff had failed to raise a factual issue on whether he was entitled to equitable tolling. Although he argued that the exhaustion period took over four years, because he waited for an administrative body to notify him of the conclusion of its investigation before he began the next step of his exhaustion requirement, the majority ruled that he failed to submit sworn evidence that he had relied on the investigation in delaying his exhaustion or that he had diligently pursued his remedies. To the contrary, the evidence showed that the plaintiff did not wait for the conclusion of the investigation before re-starting the administrative exhaustion requirement. It also did not show diligence. He therefore failed to show entitlement to equitable tolling.
A dissenting judge opined that the majority had failed to give the plaintiff the latitude to which pro se prisoners are entitled, and had come up with arguments that the defendants did not make in their answering brief.
In Rubenstein v. Doe 1, published August 28, 2017, the California Supreme Court reversed a Court of Appeal decision that the plaintiff had complied with the Government Claims Act deadline to present a timely claim. The plaintiff alleged that in 1993-1994, when she was a high school student, her coach, an employee of the defendant district, sexually molested her. She presented a claim for damages to the district in 2012, when she was 34. She alleged that latent memories of the sexual abuse resurfaced in 2012. She contended that the claim was timely. The Government Claims Act requires that a personal injury claim for damages be presented to the defendant public entity no later than six months after accrual. Under Government Code section 901, the date of accrual for purposes of the Government Claims Act is the accrual date that would pertain under the statute of limitations applicable to a dispute between private litigants. The plaintiff contended that Code of Civil Procedure section 340.1 creates the date of accrual for claims alleging failure to prevent childhood molestation. Section 340.1, as it existed at the time of the molestation and as subsequently amended between 1990 and 2002, expanded the statute of limitations for childhood sexual molestation. It extended the deadline to sue to the plaintiff's 26th birthday; then, in 2002 while the plaintiff was still under 26, it allowed suits after the 26th birthday if the defendant was on notice of unlawful sexual conduct by an employee and failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the misconduct.
The Supreme Court majority concluded that section 340.1 did not set the accrual date for childhood sexual molestation claims. Instead, it tolled the statute of limitation for suing for injuries from molestation. That does not affect the time to present a claim. The cause of action accrues at the time the abuse occurs. The court based this conclusion on the wording of the statute; on case law interpreting similar statutes; on the policy behind the claim statutes, in preventing late claims that endanger public entity fiscal planning and result in difficulties in investigation or preventing future harm; and on the 2008 passage of Government Code section 905, subdivision (m), which eliminates the claim requirement for childhood molestation claims, but only for conduct occurring after 2009. The limitation on the amendment shows a legislative intention to limit public entity exposure for molestation claims. The court also rejected the argument that section 340.1 provided a delayed discovery standard of accrual for molestation claims. The court disapproved the decision in K.J. v. Arcadia Unified School Dist. (2009) 172 Cal.App.4th 1229.
Justice Werdegar dissented. She opined that the majority's decision immunized public entities from liability for pre-2009 molestation claims.
In Klein v. Beverly Hills, published August 4, 2017, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed in part and affirmed in part a summary judgment granted on a 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit alleging that search warrants for the plaintiff's home and computer were obtained by false statements and omissions by the investigating detectives. The plaintiff brought the suit three and a half years after the searches were executed. In the meantime, the plaintiff made multiple attempts to obtain the sealed affidavits that the police submitted to the court to obtain the search warrants. Eventually, after the lawsuit was filed, the affidavits were produced in discovery. Soon after, the district court granted summary judgment on the ground that the two-year statute of limitations barred the action.
The 9th Circuit rejected the argument that the cause of action accrued when the searches under the warrants were executed. Instead, the federal discovery standard of accrual applies. Under that standard, the plaintiff's cause of action accrues when the plaintiff knows or has reason to know of his injury. The standard requires the plaintiff to be diligent in discovering the critical facts of the case. While ordinary 4th Amendment search and seizure claims accrue when the allegedly illegal search or seizure took place, judicial deception claims involve false or misleading representations that may not be obvious at the time of the allegedly illegal search. The discovery rule therefore applies, and the cause of action does not accrue until the affidavit submitted to obtain the search warrant becomes reasonably available. There was no dispute that the plaintiff here was diligent, so the discovery rule applied and his action was timely.
In a separate unpublished decision, the court affirmed summary judgment to the extent it was based on the merits of the plaintiff's claim.
In Avila v. Spokane School Dist. 81, published March 30, 2017, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the dismissal of claims under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act as time-barred. The Administrative Law Judge who heard the plaintiff's parents' due process complaint under the IDEA ruled that claims based on occurrences that took place more than two years before the parents filed their due process complaint were barred by the IDEA's two-year statute of limitations. The district court agreed.
In a matter of first impression, the 9th Circuit sought to harmonize two provisions of the IDEA that set forth statutes of limitations. 20 U.S.C. § 1415(f)(3)(C) prescribes that parents shall request a due process hearing "within 2 years of the date the parent or agency knew or should have known about the alleged action that forms the basis of the complaint . . . ." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(b)(6)(B) prescribes that parents have an opportunity to present a complaint "which sets forth an alleged violation that occurred not more than 2 years before the date the parent or public agency knew or should have known about the alleged action that forms the basis of the complaint . . . ." The court rejected a "2+2" interpretation under which the parents have two years from discovery to file a complaint about actions that occurred up to two years before discovery. Instead, the 9th Circuit concluded that under the IDEA, the statute of limitations for parents to file a due process complaint is two years from the date they knew or should have known of the alleged actions that form the basis of the complaint.
In Manuel v. Joliet, published March 21, 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Seventh Circuit's decision affirming district court dismissal of a 42 U.S.C. section 1983 lawsuit brought by an arrestee held in jail 48 days before release. During a traffic stop of the plaintiff, the police found pills that twice tested negative for being illegal drugs. Yet, the plaintiff's lawsuit alleged, the officers arrested the plaintiff without any evidence that he committed a crime; and a technician allegedly lied that the pills contained ecstasy. The plaintiff was brought before a criminal judge, who concluded--allegedly based only on the false report--that probable cause existed to send the plaintiff to jail to await trial. While he was in jail, another test of the pills was negative for illegal drugs. Plaintiff remained in jail for over a month after that test, until he was freed on motion of the prosecution. The Seventh Circuit held that once the judge ordered the plaintiff to jail, he was held pursuant to legal process, and he could not state a claim for being held in violation of the Fourth Amendment Searches and Seizures clause. Instead, he could claim only denial of due process, and he had sufficient due process.
The Supreme Court held, 6-2, that when an arrestee is imprisoned based on legal process, but that process is based only on false evidence, the arrestee has a claim that the post-process, pre-trial imprisonment violated the arrestee's Fourth Amendment rights. The Court remanded the issue of when the cause of action accrues.
In City of San Diego v. Superior Court (Dines), published January 20, 2016, the 4th District Court of Appeal, Division 1, issued a peremptory writ of mandate reversing the trial court's order granting a Government Code section 946.6 petition for relief from the claim requirements. The plaintiff missed the deadline to present a timely claim to the city. She filed an application for leave to present late claim, which the city denied. On the date of denial, the city mailed the plaintiff a notice of the denial. It stated that if she wished to file a court action on the matter, she must first petition the court for an order relieving her from Government Code section 945.4's claim-presentation requirement; and that the petition must be filed with the court within six months from the date the application was denied. The plaintiff filed her petition for relief with the court more than six months after the date the application was denied, but within six months and five days of the date the notice of denial was mailed. The trial court granted the petition. It ruled that Government Code section 915.2, subdivision (b), extended the time to petition for relief, because it extends five days the time for responding to any notice under the Government Claims Act if the notice is mailed.
The appellate court agreed with the city's argument that Rason v. Santa Barbara City Housing Authority (1988) 201 Cal.App.3d 817 controlled. Rason held that because subdivision (b) of Government Code section 946.6 states that a petition must be filed within six months of the date a late-claim application is denied, the six months to file runs from the date of denial, and is not based on the date of the notice of denial. Rason contrasted this deadline with another statute of limitations in the Government Claims Act, Government Code section 945.6, which provides that the time to file a lawsuit runs from the date a notice denying a claim is mailed or presented. The Rason court invited the Legislature to change this discrepancy between the two statutes of limitation. The Legislature never did, supporting an inference that it intended that the six-month period to petition runs from the date of denial.
Although Government Code section 915.2, subdivision (b), was amended in 2002 to provide that any duty to respond after receipt of service of a notice is extended five days if the notice is served by mail, that amendment does not apply to the time to petition, because that time does not run from the date of service or receipt of the notice of the late-claim application's denial, but rather from the denial itself.

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