Opinion ID: 566791
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Thirty-day Statute of Limitations

Text: 43 The district court also held that it was jurisdictionally barred from deciding the 1986 IEP claim by Florida's thirty-day time limit on commencing appeals. See Fla.R.App.P. 9.110(b). We disagree. 44 We will assume without deciding that the district court properly borrowed the thirty-day limitation period from the Florida Appellate Procedure Act. 1 Even if the court properly borrowed the thirty-day period, however, this period would be only a statute of limitation, not a jurisdictional bar. The thirty-day period would be a jurisdictional bar only if J.S.K.'s parents were relying on state law for their cause of action. Cf., United States v. Broward County, 901 F.2d 1005, 1008-09 (11th Cir.1990) (in federal common-law cause of action in quasi-contract, district court erred in relying on state limitation period as jurisdictional bar). Here, the district court borrowed the thirty-day period because Congress failed to include a statute of limitations within the federal cause of action it created in section 1415(e)(2). So, the district court was borrowing only a statute of limitations. 45 We have said before that raising of the statute of limitations is an affirmative defense. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama v. Weitz, 913 F.2d 1544, 1552 (11th Cir.1990) (citing Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(c)); cf. Fassett v. Delta Kappa Epsilon (New York), 807 F.2d 1150, 1167 (3d Cir.1986) (A statute of limitations time bar is not jurisdictional; rather, it constitutes an affirmative defense that is waived if the defendant fails to raise it in his answer.). The Board failed to assert in its original answer the statute-of-limitations affirmative defense. Also, when it tried later to amend its answer to include this affirmative defense, the district court denied the motion. 2 Because the Board never effectively raised the thirty-day statute-of-limitation affirmative defense and because the Board on appeal fails to address whether the district court erred in denying its motion to amend, the Board has waived this affirmative defense. J.S.K.'s parents were not time-barred from bringing their 1986 IEP claim.