Court Opinion

ID: 9716544
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:43:19.899549+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:46.720160
License: Public Domain

DICKSON, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority avoids application of the ten-year statute of repose by declaring an exception for injuries resulting from "protracted exposure to an inherently dangerous foreign substance which is visited into the body." Such a judicial revision of Ind. Code § 83-1-1.5-5 is unacceptable.
Courts are not at liberty to construe a statute that is unambiguous. Community Hosp. of Anderson and Madison County v. McKnight (1986), Ind., 493 N.E.2d 775; Evans v. Yankeetown Dock Corp. (1986), Ind., 491 N.E.2d 969; Burks v. Bolerjack (1981), Ind., 427 N.E.2d 887. The plain language of the products liability ten-year statute of repose is clear and free from ambiguity. It is therefore our duty to accept and apply the statute as written unless it exceeds the power of the legislature to act.
Even when statutory construction is undertaken, an appellate tribunal may not substitute its judgment for that of the legislature. Johnson v. St. Vincent Hosp., Inc. (1980), 273 Ind. 374, 404 N.E.2d 585. The wisdom or desirability of a statute is not a proper matter for judicial evaluation. Walton v. State (1980), 272 Ind. 398, 398 N.E.2d 667.
*390For these reasons, I am compelled to conclude that, absent constitutional infirmity, the ten-year statute of repose must be applied to product liability actions commenced more than ten years after delivery of the product to the initial user or consumer.
While I cannot agree with the majority's reasoning, I would favor that this Court undertake a review of the constitutional questions, particularly with respect to Art. 1, §§ 12 and 23 of the Constitution of Indiana.
Section 12. All courts shall be open; and every person, for injury done to him in his person, property, or reputation, shall have remedy by due course of law....
Section 28. The General Assembly shall not grant to any citizen, or class of citizens, privileges or immunities which, upon the same terms, shall not equally belong to all citizens.
Our recent decisions suggest that these issues remain unresolved. In Dague v. Piper Aircraft Corp. (1981), 275 Ind. 520, 418 N.E.2d 207, we held that the products liability statute of repose did not contravene Section 12. (Dague did not involve a Section 28 challenge.) However, language in contemporaneous and subsequent analogous decisions presents significant qualification or equivocation on the constitutional issues. In Bunker v. National Gypsum Co. (1982), Ind., 441 N.E.2d 8, 12, we stated that a "statute of limitations will comport with the constitutional demand for due process so long as it provides a reasonable time for the bringing of an action." Similarly, in Short v. Texaco, Inc. (1980), 273 Ind. 518, 525, 406 N.E.2d 625, 630, aff'd (1982), 454 U.S. 516, 102 S.Ct. 781, 70 L.Ed.2d 738, this Court declared Indiana to be in accord with the rule that statutes of limitation are not unconstitutional if reasonable time is given for the commencement of an action before the bar takes effect. Likewise, in Rohrabaugh v. Wagoner (1980), 274 Ind. 661, 664, 413 N.E.2d 891, 893, application of the two-year medical malpractice statute of limitations to certain minors was upheld against a constitutional challenge because "[t]he bar does not fall until a reasonable time for filing has expired."
I would therefore favor that this Court engage in an analysis of the product liability statute of repose, not by way of statutory construction as undertaken by the majority, but rather by constitutional analysis so that we may review questions of its constitutionality under Art. 1, §§ 12 and 23 of the Constitution of Indiana, and so that we may reconsider and resolve the apparent inconsistencies between Dague and other recent analagous cases.