Opinion ID: 2299356
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Accounting Claim

Text: The Court of Special Appeals held below that petitioners' third count, a request for an equitable accounting of any proceeds of the Ashmere Interests received by respondent, was properly dismissed because [t]he statute of limitations ha[d] extinguished the underlying rights the equitable remedy of accounting seeks to safeguard. Id. at 110, 716 A.2d at 1095. Thus, the court essentially agreed with the circuit court that the dismissal of counts one and two left no basis for the accounting claim. Based on this reasoning, our instruction to the Court of Special Appeals to vacate the order of the trial court as to the declaratory judgment claims requires us also to instruct the intermediate appellate court to vacate the dismissal of the accounting claim. [5] The Court of Special Appeals also held that the third claim was subject to the doctrine of laches. That issue was raised, and thus preserved, by respondent in both his motion to the trial court and his brief before the intermediate appellate court. Petitioners did not raise this issue in their request for the writ of certiorari and, therefore, we lack jurisdiction to review the matter. See Md. Rule 8-131(b). Because the trial court did not rule on the matter of laches, however, and appellate courts generally are restricted to determining whether the trial court's grounds for granting the motion to dismiss were legally correct, see Bobo, 346 Md. at 709, 697 A.2d at 1373, we shall instruct that the issue of laches, if raised on remand, be heard and determined by the circuit court.