Opinion ID: 1917563
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL v. MORSANI

Text: This Court in Major League Baseball v. Morsani, 790 So.2d 1071 (Fla.2001), addressed the question of whether the tolling proscription in section 95.051 applies to equitable estoppel. [7] There, Major League Baseball alleged that Morsani's tort claim was barred by the statute of limitations and that Morsani could not assert the doctrine of equitable estoppel because the doctrine was excluded by section 95.051. This Court disagreed, concluded that the doctrines of tolling and equitable estoppel are as different as apples and oranges, and held that the tolling proscription in section 95.051 is inapplicable to equitable estoppel. In reaching this decision, the Court examined the principles underlying the statutes of limitation and equitable estoppel.
Statutes of limitation, which impose a strict time limit on the filing of legal actions, were nonexistent at common law and instead are a creature of modern statutory law: At common law, there were no fixed time limits for filing lawsuits. Rather, fixed limitations on actions are predicated on public policy and are a product of modern legislative, rather than judicial, processes. A prime purpose underlying statutes of limitation is to protect defendants from unfair surprise and stale claims: As a statute of [limitations], they afford parties needed protection against the necessity of defending claims which, because of their antiquity, would place the defendant at a grave disadvantage. In such cases how resolutely unfair it would be to award one who has willfully or carelessly slept on his legal rights an opportunity to enforce an unfresh claim against a party who is left to shield himself from liability with nothing more than tattered or faded memories, misplaced or discarded records, and missing or deceased witnesses. Indeed, in such circumstances, the quest for truth might elude even the wisest court. Nardone v. Reynolds, 333 So.2d 25, 36 (Fla.1976) (quoting Wilkinson v. Harrington, 104 R.I. 224, 243 A.2d 745, 752 (1968)). Major League Baseball v. Morsani, 790 So.2d 1071, 1074-75 (Fla.2001) (footnotes omitted). Time limitations on legal actions in Florida ordinarily are governed by the statutes of limitation set forth in chapter 95, [8] but as noted above, time limitations on chapter 768 actions are controlled by section 768.28(13).
The preclusive effect of the statutes of limitation can be deflected by various legal theories, including the doctrine of equitable estoppel. The Court described the contours of this doctrine: The doctrine of equitable estoppel has been a fundamental tenet of Anglo-American jurisprudence for centuries: Estoppe, says Lord Coke, cometh of the French word estoupe, from whence the English word stopped; and it is called an estoppel or conclusion, because a man's own act or acceptance stoppeth or closeth up his mouth to allege or plead [otherwise]. Lancelot Feilding Everest, Everest and Strode's Law of Estoppel 1 (3d ed.1923). The doctrine, which was part of the English common law when the State of Florida was founded, was adopted and codified by the Florida Legislature in 1829. Equitable estoppel is based on principles of fair play and essential justice and arises when one party lulls another party into a disadvantageous legal position: Equitable estoppel is the effect of the voluntary conduct of a party whereby he is absolutely precluded, both at law and in equity, from asserting rights which perhaps have otherwise existed, either of property or of contract, or of remedy, as against another person, who has in good faith relied upon such conduct and has been led thereby to change his position for the worse, and who on his part acquires some corresponding right, either of property, or of contract or of remedy. The doctrine of estoppel is applicable in all cases where one, by word, act or conduct, willfully caused another to believe in the existence of a certain state of things, and thereby induces him to act on this belief injuriously to himself, or to alter his own previous condition to his injury. State ex rel. Watson v. Gray, 48 So.2d 84, 87-88 (Fla.1950) (quoting 3 Pomeroy's Equity Jurisprudence § 804 (5th ed.1941)). Major League Baseball, 790 So.2d at 1076 (footnote omitted). Equitable estoppel differs from other legal theories that may operate upon the statutes of limitation in that equitable estoppel presupposes an act of wrongdoingsuch as fraud and concealmentthat prejudices a party's case: Equitable estoppel presupposes a legal shortcoming in a party's case that is directly attributable to the opposing party's misconduct. The doctrine bars the wrongdoer from asserting that shortcoming and profiting from his or her own misconduct. Equitable estoppel thus functions as a shield, not a sword, and operates against the wrongdoer, not the victim. This Court has applied the doctrine for more than a century and a half. Major League Baseball, 790 So.2d at 1077.