Opinion ID: 197499
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: issues

Text: The principal legal issues in dispute in this case concern limitation of tort actions under the law of Puerto Rico. More precisely, the dispute centers on the meaning of statutory provisions and opinions of courts of Puerto Rico interpreting them, particularly with respect to levels of awareness of injury, source of injury, causal connection, and legal responsibility. To what extent is the running of the statutory time limit of one year for the filing of tort actions for damages affected by lack of awareness of injury, a connection between injury and the personal services or other conduct of a person, and legal responsibility for the injury? To what extent is the running of the statutory time limit of one year affected by lack of awareness of a connection between -2- injury and a product of a manufacturer or other supplier of the product? To what extent is the running of the limitation period affected by the representations of the person who caused the injury, or of third persons, regarding the nature and source of a plaintiff's injury? Answers to these questions must be determined as matters of law. Accordingly, this court reviews the district court's rulings on these issues de novo. The matters of law we are deciding, of course, are matters of the law of Puerto Rico. Both in the district court and in this court on appeal, the determination of these questions of law does not involve any discretion to fashion rules of law. Instead, our objective is solely to determine what is the law as indicated by authoritative sources. Primary among these authoritative sources are the plainly expressed holdings of the highest court of Puerto Rico. See, e.g., Daigle v. Maine Med. Ctr., Inc., 14 F.3d 684, 689 (1st Cir. 1994) (noting that in applying state law, a federal court is absolutely bound by a current interpretation of that law formulated by the state's highest tribunal). Where a jurisdiction's highest court has not spoken on a precise issue of law, we look to analogous state court decisions, persuasive adjudications by courts of sister states, learned treatises, and public policy considerations identified in state decisional law in order to make an informed prophecy of -3- how the state court would rule on the precise issue. Blinzler v. Marriott Int'l, Inc., 81 F.3d 1148, 1151 (1st Cir. 1996). II. Puerto Rico Law Regarding the Statute of Limitation
The Puerto Rico statute of limitation for tort actions provides for a one-year limitation period that begins to run from the time the aggrieved person has knowledge of the injury. P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 31, S 5298 (1994). Plaintiff bears the burden of proving when the damage became known. Rivera Encarnacion v. Comm. of Puerto Rico , 113 P.R. Dec. 383, 385, 13 P.R. Offic. Trans. 498, 501 (1982). What is it that one must know in order to have knowledge of the injury? The Supreme Court of Puerto Rico has stated that a plaintiff will be deemed to have knowledge of the injury, for purposes of the statute of limitation, when she has notice of the injury, plus notice of the person who caused it. Colon Prieto v. Geigel, 115 P.R. Dec. 232, (1984), 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. 313, 330 [citations hereafter to P.R. Offic. Trans.]. See also Fragoso v. Lopez, 991 F.2d 878, 886 (1st Cir. 1993); Santiago Hodge v. Parke Davis & Co. , 909 F.2d 628, 632 (1st Cir. 1990); Barretto Peat v. Luis Ayala Colon Sucrs., 896 F.2d 656, 658 (1st Cir. 1990); Hodge v. Parke Davis & Co., 833 F.2d 6, 7 (1st Cir. 1987). Notice of the injury, as explained in a later case, is established by proof of: some outward or physical signs through which the aggrieved party may become aware -4- and realize that he [or she] has suffered an injurious aftereffect, which when known becomes a damage even if at the time its full scope and extent cannot be weighed. These circumstances need not be known in order to argue that the damage has become known, because its scope, extent and weight may be established later on during the prosecution of the remedial action. Delgado Rodriguez v. Nazario de Ferrer , No. CE-86-417, slip op. at 10 (Official English Translation) (P.R. May 16, 1988) (quoting H. Brau del Toro, Los Danos y Perjuicios Extracontractuales en Puerto Rico 639-40, Pub. J.T.S., Inc. (2d ed. 1986)) (internal quotation marks omitted). Once a plaintiff is on notice of the injury, the plaintiff may not wait for his [or her] injury to reach its final degree of development and postpone the running of the period of limitation according to his [or her] subjective appraisal and judgment. Ortiz v. Municipality of Orocovis, 113 P.R. Dec. 484, 487, 13 P.R. Offic. Trans. 619, 622 (1982). In some circumstances, awareness of the existence of an injury, on its own, will not be enough to trigger the running of the limitation period. See, e.g., Galarza v. Zagury, 739 F.2d 20, 24 (1st Cir. 1984) (stating that knowledge of the author of the harm means more than an awareness of some ill effects resulting from an operation by a particular doctor). If a plaintiff is not aware of some level of reasonable likelihood of legal liability on the part of the person or entity that caused the injury, the statute of limitation will be tolled. In other words, a plaintiff must also have knowledge of the author of the injury, a concept -5- articulated at length in the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico's decision in Colon Prieto. In Colon Prieto, the plaintiff experienced pain and insensitivity in his tongue following dental surgery in November 1971. 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 317. Geigel, the dental surgeon, told plaintiff that he had bitten himself on the tongue and that the symptoms would subside in a short while. Id. For over a year, Colon Prieto continued to see Geigel, who told him that the pain would go away. Id. But the symptoms did not subside. In November 1972, plaintiff consulted with another physician, and learned for the first time that the pain was the result of Geigel's having cut a nerve during the initial operation. Colon Prieto brought suit against Geigel on September 10, 1973, more than one year after the original operation. Geigel asserted the statute of limitation as a defense. The Supreme Court of Puerto Rico rejected Geigel's defense, holding that, because Colon Prieto did not acquire knowledge of the nature of his injury and Geigel's role in the injury until the November 1972 consultation with the other doctor, plaintiff was not barred under the Puerto Rico statute of limitation. Distinguishing Colon Prieto's case from the more traditional tort case in which a plaintiff is aware from the moment of the tortious act of the injury and its cause (for example, where a defendant's act causes something to fall on a plaintiff immediately), the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico observed that the statutory phrase ' from the time the aggrieved person had knowledge -6- thereof' ... rejects a literal and narrow reading. Id. at 327. The court noted that the legal reasoning behind a plaintiff's loss of rights under a statute of limitation is that the plaintiff is deemed to have abandoned those rights. Id. (quoting A. Borrell Macia, Responsabilidades Derivadas de Culpa Extracontractual Civil , 66, Barcelona, Ed. Bosch (2d ed. 1958)). In order for this legal reasoning to apply, therefore, such abandonment [on the part of the plaintiff] should really exist. Id.
We conclude that within the larger structure regarding the law of Puerto Rico on limitation of tort actions are three analytically separable subsidiary issues. These issues concern the circumstances in which a plaintiff can be said to have, or to lack, the requisite level of awareness for statute of limitation purposes. First, the concept of true knowledge applies where a plaintiff is actually aware of all the necessary facts and the existence of a likelihood of a legal cause of action. Second, concepts of notice and deemed knowledge apply. Under these concepts a plaintiff's subjective awareness is measured against the level of awareness that the plaintiff, having been put on notice as to certain facts and having exercised reasonable care regarding a potential claim, should have acquired. Third, the law or Puerto Rico recognizes an exception to applicability of the concepts of notice and deemed knowledge for circumstances in which a -7- plaintiff's failure to make a timely filing of a claim is reasonably based upon the assurances of the person who caused the injury. From a structural perspective, two of these questions (about true knowledge and deemed knowledge) concern alternative ways in which a defendant may establish that a claim is barred because it is filed too late. If the defendant succeeds in showing that plaintiff has not satisfied, or cannot satisfy, plaintiff's burden of proving lack of true knowledge (that is, lack of full awareness of all that need be known to preclude tolling), final judgment for the defendant on the ground of late filing is appropriate. If, instead, the finder of fact finds (or the court, by determining that the evidence of record is so one-sided as to compel a finding) that the plaintiff was aware of enough facts to constitute notice and to satisfy the deemed knowledge rule of the Puerto Rico law of limitation of tort actions, final judgment for the defendant on the ground of late filing is appropriate unless plaintiff has proffered evidence sufficient to support a finding that representations and assurances by the defendant persuaded plaintiff to rely reasonably and delay institution of a civil action. The unless clause in the next preceding sentence may be treated either as a condition to be satisfied before the deemed knowledge rule applies, or as a negation of an otherwise adequate showing of applicability of the deemed knowledge rule. Under -8- either analytic treatment of the substantive requirement of the legal test for deemed knowledge, this substantive requirement is the third of the analytically separable issues to which we referred above. It creates another possibility of a plaintiff's showing that a genuine dispute of material fact precludes a judgment as a matter of law for the defendant on the limitation ground.
A Subjective Component of the Legal Test In circumstances where a plaintiff has not abandoned a cause of action, but instead was never aware that such a cause of action existed, the statute of limitation would not operate as a bar to the exercise of the plaintiff's legal rights. See Colon Prieto, 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 327-328. As the court noted in Colon Prieto, a plaintiff who is not aware of the existence of a cause of action is essentially incapable of bringing suit within the limitation period. Id. at 327. The emphasis on the plaintiff's subjective ability to bring suit is justified, at least in part, by the brevity of the limitation period. Id. at 328. Reasoning from these premises, the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico held that, in order for the limitation period to start to run, a plaintiff must be able to institute suit, which requires knowledge of the existence of an injury and knowledge of the person who caused the injury. Knowledge of who caused the injury, the court held, was necessary so that the plaintiff would know whom to sue. Id. at 330 (quoting I A. Barrell y Soler, Derecho Civil Espanol 500, Barcelona, Ed. Bosch (1955)). -9- In setting forth this standard, the court in Colon Prieto stated that it was adopting a subjective standard. Id. at 328. In the law of Puerto Rico, a legal test of this kind is sometimes referred to as grounded in the cognitive theory of damages. See, e.g., Barretto Peat, 896 F.2d at 657 (describing S 5298 of Puerto Rico's Civil Code as codifying the cognitive theory). To understand this component of the applicable legal test, for the purpose of applying it to the case now before us, we must understand what level of awareness is required as to particulars of the injury and its source. Was the source in personal services, or in some other form of conduct of some identifiable person, or in a product used or supplied by some person and obtained through a chain of distribution involving one or more others, including a manufacturer? Under the law of Puerto Rico, the plaintiff's level of awareness about these matters may be relevant in more than a single way, bearing upon more than a single sub-issue. First. What effect is to be given to evidence, if creditworthy, of the effect that post-injury conduct of a person who was a cause of the injury, or post-injury conduct of other persons, had on plaintiff's refraining from or delaying instituting suit? Second. What more would the plaintiff have learned about the injury and authorship of the injury if the plaintiff, having notice in the sense of awareness of some facts, had then made the inquiries that a careful person would have made? -10-
The Objective Component We understand the court in Colon Prieto to have been speaking quite explicitly to the second of these two questions (stated immediately above) in the passage of the opinion noting that, if a plaintiff's ignorance of an injury and its origin was due to the plaintiff's own negligence or lack of care, then the statute of limitation would not be tolled. See Colon Prieto, 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 327-29 (quoting A. Borrell Macia, Responsabilidades Derivadas de Culpa Extracontractual Civil 344-345 (Bosch ed. 2d ed. 1958)). This point is associated with the level of awareness implicit in the concept of notice. The law of Puerto Rico treats a person as being aware of all that, having awareness constituting notice, that person would have been likely to come to know through the exercise of care. Thus, we understand the holdings of Puerto Rico decisions to mean that actual knowledge is not required where, by due diligence, such knowledge would likely have been acquired. Villarini-Garcia v. Hospital del Maestro, Inc., 8 F.3d 81, 84 (1st Cir. 1993). It follows, then, that to determine the point at which a plaintiff should be held responsible for the required level of awareness of whether another particular person was an author of the injury, a court looks to whether plaintiff knew or with the degree of diligence required by law would have known whom to sue. Kaiser v. Armstrong World Indus., 872 F.2d 512, 516 (1st Cir. 1989) (citations and internal quotation omitted). -11- Once a plaintiff is made aware of facts sufficient to put her on notice that she has a potential tort claim, she must pursue that claim with reasonable diligence, or risk being held to have relinquished her right to pursue it later, after the limitation period has run. See, e.g., Villarini, 8 F.3d at 85. In Villarini, a plaintiff was made aware of facts sufficient for her to be able to file suit (as to two of her claims) three weeks after her operation. We held that the plaintiff was time-barred from bringing those claims roughly two and a half years later. Id. We recognized in Villarini that the plaintiff may not have understood fully the legal significance of the facts known to her after her operation, but also recognized that the meaning of authoritative declarations of the law of Puerto Rico is that there is nothing unfair in a policy that insists that the plaintiff promptly assert her rights. Id. Thus, plaintiff's failure to consult with a lawyer or otherwise investigate the claim to which she had been alerted by the factual circumstances associated with the operation barred her from commencing that claim in the courts over one year after being on notice. Id. Similarly, once a plaintiff is put on notice that someone or some entity is the cause of the injury, the plaintiff may not succeed in a late-filed claim by asserting ignorance about the precise identity of the tortfeasor. Also, because corporate identities and intracorporate relationships are a matter of public record, knowledge of the precise corporate identity of the entity responsible for a plaintiff's injury is not required before the -12- period prescribed by the statute of limitation begins to run. See Hodge v. Parke Davis & Co., 833 F.2d 6, 7-8 (1st Cir. 1987).
An exception to the rule of notice (the objective component of the law of limitation of tort actions) is recognized. If a plaintiff's suspicions that she may have been the victim of a tort are assuaged by assurances made by the person who caused the injury, a plaintiff will not be held responsible for failing to pursue her claim more aggressively. Colon Prieto, 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 329-330. In addition to holdings discussed above (in explanation of both the subjective and the objective components of the law of Puerto Rico), the court in Colon Prieto held that, where the plaintiff's doctor (the person responsible for causing the injury) assured the plaintiff that the pain was normal and was due to plaintiff's biting his tongue during the operation, the plaintiff would not be held to have known of the injury and the cause until the later consultation. This ruling, the court observed, was the fairest and most equitable. We safeguard the aggrieved party's right to seek redress, while we abstain from rewarding the person who, having caused the damage, took refuge in his patient's trust and ignorance trying to avail himself of the circumstances in order to defeat the action. Id. at 330. In this context, where a diligent plaintiff reasonably relies upon representations made by a tortfeasor that her symptoms are not the result of a negligent or otherwise tortious act, that -13- plaintiff is not barred, because of her own negligence or lack of care, from the benefit of tolling of the limitation period. See Colon Prieto, 15 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 329-330. See also Villarini, 8 F.3d at 85-86. Stated another way, the condition attached to a plaintiff's right of tolling -- the condition that she act with care to make additional inquiries once she is on notice -- does not apply (or is excused, or negated) when the plaintiff reasonably relies on what others told her. The reliance, however, must be reasonable, and the determination of the reasonableness of a plaintiff's reliance on the assurances of others involves an evaluation that, depending upon the circumstances, may or may not be a question for the finder of fact, and thus may or may not preclude summary judgment. See id. at 8687. Where facts sufficient to support every element of a claim relating to an injury are apparent to a plaintiff at an earlier time, it will not be reasonable for the plaintiff to rely on assurances of a tortfeasor and fail to pursue the claim. See id. at 86 (where plaintiff had all the information necessary for a failure-to-warn claim, doctor's subsequent reassurances would not excuse plaintiff's lack of diligence in pursuing the claim). Our holdings, moreover, support the conclusion that a time will come at which, if the tortfeasor's initial predictions are not borne out, a plaintiff's reliance is no longer reasonable. Id. Finally, representations made by third-party doctors constitute another factor to consider in determining whether a plaintiff's continued -14- reliance upon the reassurances of a tortfeasor is reasonable. See Villarini, 8 F.3d at 86 (holding that varying diagnoses of different doctors, along with the reassurances of the negligent physician, could have lulled a reasonable person into believing for a year or more that the operation had not been botched).
In sum, we conclude (1) that within the larger questions regarding the law of Puerto Rico on limitation of tort actions are three analytically separable subsidiary questions; (2) that from a structural perspective, two of these questions (about true knowledge and deemed knowledge) concern alternative ways a defendant may establish that a claim is barred because filed too late; (3) that, if on the evidence proffered in a case, a finder of fact might reasonably find that representations and assurances persuaded plaintiff to rely reasonably and delay institution of a civil action, summary judgment for defendants would be inappropriate; and (4) that this remains true even if the record would otherwise require judgment for defendant under the rule of notice and deemed knowledge.