Opinion ID: 1394280
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Gardiner's cause of action has accrued and is time barred

Text: Cross-appellant, WHF asserts that even if the proper statute of limitations is KRS 413.245, the action is not time barred because the action against MLS has not yet accrued. In particular WHF asks this Court to hold that damages would not accrue until the damages are fixed and nonspeculative. Alagia, Day, Trautwein & Smith v. Broadbent, 882 S.W.2d 121, 126 (Ky.1994). See also Meade County Bank v. Wheatley, 910 S.W.2d 233 (Ky.1995) (holding that damages were not fixed until a bank actually sold certain property and the deficiency between the price of the house and debt owed was apparent). Such a standard would toll the statute of limitations until it was known with absolute certainty the amount of damages flowing from an incident. WHF argues that this is the correct standard because the damages arising from this case are still unknown  they argue that unknown damages may still occur or the parties may discover that Gardiner suffered no damages at all. WHF misstates the law in this area. Kentucky law has never required a specified dollar amount be known before the statute of limitations can run. Board of Education of Estill County v. Zurich Insurance, 180 F.Supp.2d 890, 893 (E.D.Ky.2002) (. . . if plaintiff's interpretation is accepted, the limitations period for professional negligence actions would be effectively tolled until damages could be specified as an ascertainable sum certain. This, of course, is not the law.) The statute of limitations begins to run as soon as the injury becomes known to the injured. Conway v. Huff, 644 S.W.2d 333 (Ky.1982); Gill v. Warren, 751 S.W.2d 33 (Ky.App.1988). Broadbent, supra , is distinguishable from this matter because in Broadbent there could not be certainty of damages until there was a final adjudication of the legal matter in question to show that there was in fact injury. Meade County Bank, supra , is also distinguishable because in that case one could not know if there was an injury until the bank sold a foreclosed house and saw that the debt owed to them was to be unpaid. In this matter, there was a definite point when Gardiner Entities should have known there were going to be damages. See Old Mason's Home v. Mitchell, 892 S.W.2d 304, 307-308 (Ky.App.1995) (holding that the statute of limitations in KRS 413.245 is triggered as soon as defects in workmanship are apparent). Potential damages were apparent when MLS walked off the job and certainly apparent when the Gardiner Entities attempted mediation with MLS in December 1999. At this time the Gardiner Entities produced a document which stated all of Gardiner Design's Known Damages and drafted a letter which stated that Only within the last month have all of the problems and deficiencies with MLS's design been uncovered and fixed. It is obvious from the record that the Gardiner Entities were well aware that MLS's actions caused them damages and had a good idea what those damages were in 1999. Since it appears from the record that the Gardiner Entities knew they had suffered damages as early as December 1999, but did not file suit until September 2001, the applicable statute of limitations expired rendering the suit time barred.