Opinion ID: 202112
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: A Threshold Question: Effect of Multiple Theories

Text: 51 In this case, Rakes and Dammers ask us to conduct this accrual analysis three times, each with respect to a different proposed explanation of the way in which the government caused their injury. The plaintiffs' first theory is that the government caused their injury by emboldening Bulger and Flemmi, who relied on Connolly's protection and his assurances of immunity and who would not have taken the store had it not been for those assurances. The second is that the government caused the injury when Connolly told Bulger that the Rakeses had gone to the police looking for protection. 9 The third is that they were injured through the negligent failure of Connolly's superiors to supervise him properly. 10 The plaintiffs postulate that claims under each of these three theories might accrue separately, and that therefore, while a claim under one theory might be time-barred, a claim under another would still be viable. 52 We have cases that come out on both sides of this question. Our recent decision in Callahan held that the claim at issue in that case accrued when information vital to any theory of liability first emerged. See 426 F.3d at 452. Our earlier decision in McIntyre took a different approach, permitting a plaintiff to sue on the basis of information recently acquired, without determining whether the plaintiff would have had enough information to bring a claim for the same injury, under a different theory, at an earlier point in time. See 367 F.3d at 54. 53 Neither McIntyre nor Callahan should be viewed as setting forth a flat rule, or even a generally applicable rule subject to an easily stated exception. Whether a court will need to make separate calculations as to timeliness for different theories of injury pertaining to a single set of facts, or can simply rely on the accrual date of the earliest-accruing theory, depends very much on the circumstances of the case. In some instances, it will make sense to look at the injury as a single episode, while in others separate determinations of accrual dates will have to be made. 54 In this case we need not make a precise choice as to whether the three theories (only two of which are advanced by Rakes on appeal) should be analyzed separately from one another. On the present facts, once the plaintiffs had sufficient knowledge (actual or constructive) to trigger accrual of the emboldening theory, they also had sufficient knowledge to trigger accrual of the wrongful disclosure and negligent supervision theories. 55 Starting with the wrongful disclosure theory, Rakes and Dammers knew from the day Bulger told Rakes to have Lundbohm back off that someone had tipped Bulger off about their attempt to get help from the authorities. Even if a reasonable person would not at that time have suspected FBI agent Connolly — Rakes and Dammers profess to have suspected Lundbohm initially — a diligent plaintiff would have had grounds to suspect the FBI as an alternative source for the leak at the latest by the time such plaintiff also had reasonable grounds to suspect the FBI's wrongful emboldening of Bulger and Flemmi. That is, as soon as the plaintiffs should have suspected a corrupt relationship between the FBI and Bulger and Flemmi, they should also have suspected that the FBI could have been the source of the leak that they knew years earlier had occurred. 11 56 The plaintiffs' third theory is that they were injured by the negligent failure of Connolly's superiors at the FBI to properly supervise him. This claim builds directly off of the claims concerning Connolly's own malfeasance; that is, the supervision was negligent, if at all, precisely because it failed to prevent Connolly's wrongful actions, including his emboldening of Bulger and Flemmi (which was accomplished in part by his alleged failure to report complaints like the Rakeses' to his superiors). 57 A negligent supervision theory of recovery is the sort that is normally considered, and often pursued, in any case where the primary injury was caused by a rogue lower-level employee. Certainly once the plaintiffs in this case suspected (or reasonably should have suspected) Connolly's own pervasive wrongdoing, they should also have suspected the reasonable possibility that he may have been enabled in this wrongdoing by poor, and even negligent, supervision by his superiors. Thus, this theory accrued at the same time as the two theories focused on Connolly's own alleged wrongful actions.