Court Opinion

ID: 9550268
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:33:13.747067+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:21:18.913623
License: Public Domain

SUMMERS, Justice,
dissenting.
Relying on existing caselaw the court allows 51 O.S. 1981 § 157 to provide the controlling statute of limitations. As I read that section it tells us when a claim is deemed denied by inaction, and that, according to the statute, occurs ninety (90) days after the claim has been filed. In this case the claim was denied by operation of law on February 11, 1982. The section by its terms appears to have nothing to do with when the plaintiff must file.
The section that tells the plaintiff by when he must commence his suit or have it forever barred is found in 51 O.S. 1981 § 156(C), which says:
“No action for any cause arising under this act shall be maintained unless ... the action is commenced within six (6) months after notification of denial of the claim by the clerk of the political subdivision.”
If the legislature had intended the right of action to lapse six (6) months after the claim was denied it would have been easy enough to have had the statute so provide. Since the legislature did not write it that way, and since the suit was filed on August 25, within six (6) months after “notification of denial of the claim by the clerk of the political subdivision” on March 1, 1982 it was statutorily filed.
Out of deference to the legislature we should reinstate plaintiffs’ suit, retracting and overruling all language in Neal v. Blackwell and Lucas v. Ind. Public Schools Dist. 35, both supra, contrary to 51 O.S. 1981 § 156(C).
I am authorized to advise that Justice KAUGER joins in these sentiments and *622that Justice OP ALA would join in the re-suit.