Court Opinion

ID: 9626178
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:04:36.593323+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:22.606198
License: Public Domain

MOORE, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent from the majority’s holding that the “discovery rule” applies to toll the two-year period of limitations provided by AS 09.55.580 for a wrongful death action. The majority opinion conveniently ignores dis-positive facts and misconstrues our decision in Haakanson v. Wakefield Seafoods, Inc., 600 P.2d 1087 (Alaska 1979), in order to reach its decision.
Plaintiff's decedents Douglas Stuart and Donevan Harris died when a helicopter manufactured by defendant Bell Helicopter International (hereafter Bell) and operated by Evergreen Helicopters (hereafter Evergreen) crashed near McGrath, Alaska on October 9, 1974. Subsequently, the families of the plaintiff’s decedents received *148presumptive certificates of death.1 In February and March 1976 the administrators of the decedents’ estates filed claims against Evergreen. The parties settled these claims out of court in March 1977. The administrators brought no action against Bell. The helicopter’s wreckage was found on August 21, 1982, more than five years after the settlement. On October 18, 1982 plaintiff filed the present action against Bell alleging that a mechanical defect caused the accident.
Alaska Statute 09.55.580 provides that a wrongful death “action shall be commenced within two years after the death....” The period of limitation contained in the statute represents a legislative judgment that affords plaintiffs a reasonable time to present their claims, while protecting defendants and courts from the potential injustice of dealing with stale claims. Statutes of limitation “encourage promptness in the prosecution of actions” and “attempt to protect against the difficulties caused by lost evidence, faded memories and disappearing witnesses.” Byrne v. Ogle, 488 P.2d 716, 718 (Alaska 1971). This court should not blithely interfere with the balance struck by the legislature.
We addressed an analogous statute of limitations problem in Kodiak Electric Ass’n, Inc. v. DeLaval Turbine, Inc., 694 P.2d 150 (Alaska 1984). In that case, the trial court held that the two-year limitations period of AS 09.10.070 applied to Kodiak Electric’s strict liability and negligence claims. We reversed the trial court based on the plain language of AS 09.10.050, holding that its six-year limitations period applied to actions for injury of personal property. We rejected DeLaval’s policy argument that the shorter limitations period was preferable. “[I]t is not this court’s function to consider the merits of a longer or shorter limitations period when the statute is clear and unambiguous and no contrary legislative intent has been demonstrated.” Id., at 156. I fail to understand why the majority does not follow this sound policy when addressing the plain language of the wrongful death statute. Concern about the applicable statute of limitations should be addressed to the legislature, not this court. Id., at 155 n. 9.
In Haakanson v. Wakefield Seafoods, Inc., 600 P.2d 1087 (Alaska 1979), we held that Alaska’s general tolling statute, AS 09.10.140, applied to extend the time limit in the wrongful death statute, AS 09.55.-580, for bringing an action. For purposes of applying AS 09.10.140, we concluded there was no legislative intent to treat an action for wrongful death differently than the common law tort actions. Id. at 1092.
In Haakanson, we construed the limitation period in the wrongful death statute in pari materia with the legislative directive expressed in the general tolling statute. We reasoned:
The legislature has found, however, that certain circumstances outweigh the policies underlying these statutes of limi-tations_ This statute [AS 09.10.140] expresses the public policy that favors safeguarding the interests of minors.
Id. at 1090. (Emphasis added).
Based on legislative policy, therefore, this court held that the disability of a minor statutory beneficiary tolled the running of the limitations period in the wrongful death statute.
Despite the express statutory language of the wrongful death statute, the majority in the present case applies the judicially created discovery rule to toll the limitations period. As its only justification, the majority attempts to recast Haakanson as a decision based on a common law interpretation.2 Although Haakanson involved in*149terpretation of a tolling statute for minors, the majority refers to this tolling statute as if it were a common law doctrine or rule. The majority ignores Justice Harlan’s admonition:
On the other hand, the legislature may, in order to promote other, conflicting interests, prescribe with particularity the compass of the legislative aim, erecting a strong inference that territories beyond the boundaries so drawn are not to feel the impact of the new legislative dispensation.
Moragne v. States Marine Lines, 398 U.S. 375, 392, 90 S.Ct. 1772, 1783, 26 L.Ed.2d 339, 352 (1970).
The Alaska Legislature has provided in AS 09.10.140 that the disabilities of minority, insanity, and imprisonment may serve to toll the statute of limitation. Despite the legislature’s awareness of Alaska’s high number of light aircraft and light aircraft accidents, it has declined to add lost aircraft as a new category to AS 09.-10.140.
The majority claims the adoption of the discovery rule is fundamentally fair and consistent with the purposes of the wrongful death act. They claim “it is fundamentally unfair to deprive a litigant of his right to bring a lawsuit before he has had any reasonable opportunity to do so.” This broad truism does not reflect the facts of the present case. As previously stated, plaintiff filed claims based on this accident and settled with another defendant over five years before filing this lawsuit. At that time, plaintiff could have also filed suit against Bell based on a theory such as res ipsa loquitur. See, e.g., Praznik v. Sport Aero, Inc., 42 Ill.App.3d 330, 355 N.E.2d 686 (Ill.App.1976).
The families of the plaintiff’s decedents received presumptive certificates of death. Plaintiff did not have to wait until the helicopter’s wreckage was fortuitously discovered in order to bring her action. In United States v. Kubrick, 444 U.S. 111, 100 S.Ct. 352, 62 L.Ed.2d 259 (1979), the United States Supreme Court denied relief to a tardy plaintiff under the Federal Torts Claim Act. The Court stated about the plaintiff:
If he fails to bring suit because he is incompetently or mistakenly told that he does not have a case, we discern no sound reason for visiting the consequences of such error on the defendant by delaying the accrual of the claim until the plaintiff is otherwise informed or himself determines to bring suit, even though more than two years have passed from the plaintiff’s discovery of the relevant facts about injury.
Id., 444 U.S. at 123-125, 100 S.Ct. at 360-361, 62 L.Ed.2d at 270-271. Kubrick’s reasoning aptly applies to this case.
Application of a statute of limitation may often make it impossible to enforce a previously valid claim. However, the legislature unequivocally prescribed that a cause of action for wrongful death accrues on the date of death and we should enforce that mandate. Preclusion of a legal remedy alone does not justify a judicial exception to the statute. To engraft the discovery rule on AS 09.55.580 completely ignores the statutory directive.

. The record does not indicate the date of issuance, but the parties do not dispute that the death certificates were issued more than two years before the complaint was filed in the present lawsuit.

. In Haakanson, we stated: “Since Alaska has a comprehensive wrongful death statute, whether or not there is a common law right of action is immaterial except for any difference in construction of the statute based on the contention *149that it is in derogation of the common law.” Id. at 1092, n. 11.