Court Opinion

ID: 9689630
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 18:41:47.890533+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:50.964409
License: Public Domain

VANDE WALLE, Justice,
concurring specially.
I concur in the affirmation of the summary judgment granted by the district court, *569but I do so for reasons different from those recited in the majority opinion.
I agree that the account between the State Hospital and the Hintzes was an open account and not a mutual account. Realizing that a majority of the court in Erenfeld v. Erenfeld, 196 N.W.2d 406 (N.D.1972), held that part payment on a simple open account without a written acknowledgment or promise does not toll the statute of limitations, I believe the dissent by Justice Teigen (Knudson concurring) to that opinion correctly states the law on that matter. As Justice Teigen pointed out, the majority in Erenfeld relied upon the previous decision in Hansen v. Fettig, 179 N.W.2d 739 (N.D.1970), for the proposition that part payment on a simple open account without a written acknowledgment or promise does not toll the statute of limitations, and that Hansen does not so hold. A reading of Hansen confirms that conclusion in my mind. To me, any other conclusion would obviate portions of Sections 28-01-36 and 9-12-07, N.D.D.C.
I do, however, believe that the Hintzes made payments of one dollar per day on a current-year basis and that such payments had to be applied to the current year’s obligation to the State Hospital. This is made clear by the method of payments, i. e., each payment covered a three-calendar-month period and was computed at exactly one dollar per day for each of the regular four calendar quarters through 1968. After that time, payments were made in the amount of $365 for each year. In addition the other documents, including interrogatories and affidavits, attached to the motion for summary judgment establish that the Hintzes were paying one dollar per day for the immediately preceding three-calendar-quarter period and through the payment made January 9, 1968, and for the immediately preceding calendar year after that period. Thus the Hintzes were not making payments which could be applied to the obligation of prior years to the State Hospital. Therefore, even though I believe the correct conclusion is that part payment on a simple open account without a written acknowledgment or promise does toll the statute of limitations, I do not believe the statute was tolled in this instance because the payments made by the Hintzes were for only the current-year period. Any obligations which might have been due for previous years (and this is in dispute since the Hintzes have alleged an accord and satisfaction of one dollar per day for the hospital care of their son) would be barred by the statute of limitations because there was no subsequent part payment to toll the statute for those years.
SAND, J., concurs.