Court Opinion

ID: 9737388
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 19:23:43.143199+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:23:58.577167
License: Public Domain

Sawyer, J.
(concurring). I concur with the majority’s decision to affirm the grant of summary disposition. However, unlike the majority, I do not do so only because we are obligated to follow the decision in Guerra v Garratt, 222 Mich App 285; 564 NW2d 121 (1997).
*420First, I am not convinced that our decision in Guerra was incorrect. However, I do not believe we need reach that issue because, in my view, even if there is, as the majority holds, an admission-based exception to the holding in Lemmerman v Fealk, 449 Mich 56; 534 NW2d 695 (1995), such an exception would not apply to the facts in the case at bar.
Even if I were to accept the position that repressed memory cases supported by an admission represents a situation in which a case may be brought despite the fact that the applicable limitation period has expired, the “admission” in the case at bar is not of a sufficient quality to trigger such an admission-based exception.
Defendant Shirilla’s “admission” in this case hardly amounts to an admission to plaintiff’s allegations. Plaintiff alleges that Shirilla sexually assaulted him on numerous occasions over the course of nine years, beginning when plaintiff was nine years old. Shirilla admitted that he massaged plaintiff’s chest and stomach on one occasion when plaintiff was approximately fifteen years old. Other than having hugged plaintiff or shook his hand on one other occasion in the early 1980s, Shirilla denied any other physical contact with plaintiff.
I do not equate that as admitting either a sexual assault or ongoing sexual abuse over a period of nine years. Simply put, while Shirilla may have admitted engaging in questionable conduct on one occasion, he did not admit engaging in ongoing sexual abuse of plaintiff. By contrast, in Meiers-Post v Schafer, 170 Mich App 174; 427 NW2d 606 (1988), one of the cases identified in Lemmerman as falling under the potential admission-based exception, there was a strong *421and direct admission by the defendant. In MeiersPost, the plaintiff alleged an ongoing sexual relationship with the defendant while the plaintiff was a high school student and the defendant was a teacher. The defendant admitted engaging in sexual intercourse with the plaintiff on various occasions over an extended period.
Those facts stand in stark contrast to those in the case at bar where Shirilla admitted physical contact on two occasions, one having no sexual connotation and a second that may or may not have had a sexual purpose.
Simply put, I do not believe that the “admission” in the case at bar is of the quality necessary to trigger an admission-based exception even if such an exception is recognized under Michigan law.
Accordingly, I would decline to address the issues whether Lemmerman recognized an admission-based exception and whether Guerra was correctly decided. Rather, I would hold that the facts of the case at bar do not establish a sufficient admission to trigger such an exception even if one exists. Therefore, I would also affirm the trial court’s grant of summary disposition, but not merely because I am obligated to do so under Guerra.