Court Opinion

ID: 2964002
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2015-09-21 21:18:49.827202+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:42:49.548944
License: Public Domain

USCA1 Opinion

	

          A      p      r      i      l   5      ,   1      9      9      5
                            UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT

                                ______________________

          No. 95-1962

                                 CHARLOTTE FLANAGAN,

                                Plaintiff, Appellant,

                                          v.

                           GARY I. GRANT AND MERCIA GRANT,

                                Defendants, Appellees.

                                   _______________

                                     ERRATA SHEET
                                     ERRATA SHEET

               The  opinion  of this  Court issued  on  March 27,  1996, is
          amended to reflect the following change on the cover sheet:

               James  B.  Krasnoo, with  whom Paul  J.  Klehm and  Keith B.
               __________________             _______________      ________
          Hughes were on brief for appellees.
          ______

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                           UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 
                                FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT

                                 ____________________

          No. 95-1962

                                 CHARLOTTE FLANAGAN,

                                Plaintiff, Appellant,

                                          v.

                           GARY I. GRANT AND MERCIA GRANT,

                                Defendants, Appellees.

                                 ____________________

                     APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

                          FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS

                   [Hon. Reginald C. Lindsay, U.S. District Judge]
                                              ___________________

                                 ____________________

                                        Before

                                 Selya, Circuit Judge,
                                        _____________

                           Campbell, Senior Circuit Judge,
                                     ____________________

                              and Stahl, Circuit Judge.
                                         _____________

                                 ____________________

               Carmen  L.  Durso, with  whom Mary  F.  McCabe and  Lynne A.
               _________________             ________________      ________
          Tatirosian were on brief for appellant.
          __________
               James  B.  Krasnoo, with  whom Paul  J.  Klehm and  Keith B.
               __________________             _______________      ________
          Hughes was on brief for appellees. 
          ______

                                 ____________________

                                    March 27, 1996
                                 ____________________

                                          2

                      Per Curiam.  Plaintiff-appellant Charlotte Flanagan
                      __________

            filed this diversity action against her  parents, defendants-

            appellees  Gary  and  Mercia  Grant,  in  the  United  States

            District Court for the  District of Massachusetts on November

            12, 1993.   Her  complaint alleged  that her  father sexually

            abused her for  four years,  beginning in 1980  when she  was

            fourteen, and that her mother actively helped to cover up the

            abuse  and  to  coerce  her  to  drop charges  against  him.1

            Defendants  moved  for  summary  judgment, and,  in  a  well-

            reasoned  report and  recommendation,  the  magistrate  judge

            recommended  allowing  the  motion  on the  ground  that  the

            complaint  was  time-barred   by  the  applicable  three-year

            statute  of limitations.  Flanagan v. Grant, 897 F. Supp. 637
                                      ________    _____

            (D.   Mass.  1995).     The   district  court   accepted  the

            recommendation.  Plaintiff appeals. 

                      Having  considered the record, the parties' briefs,

            and  oral  argument,  we  essentially agree  with  the  lower

            court's reasoning and  result and see no need  to go over the

            same ground  in the same detail.   See In re  San Juan Dupont
                                               ___ ______________________

            Plaza Hotel Fire  Litig., 989  F.2d 36, 38  (1st Cir.  1993).
            ________________________

            The  magistrate  judge  correctly applied  the  Massachusetts

            discovery rule to the facts of this case, taking into account

            the controlling  Massachusetts  cases including  the  leading

                                
            ____________________

            1.   Plaintiff  claimed assault  and battery,  intentional or
            negligent   infliction  of  emotional   distress,  breach  of
            fiduciary duty, and violation of her civil rights.

                                         -3-
                                          3

            authority, Riley v. Presnell,  409 Mass. 239, 565  N.E.2d 780
                       _____    ________

            (1991).   Since issuance  of the lower  court's opinion,  the

            Appeals  Court  of  Massachusetts  has  handed  down  another

            relevant decision, Phinney v. Morgan, 39 Mass. App. Ct.  202,
                               _______    ______

            654 N.E.2d 77, rev.  denied, 421 Mass. 1104, 656  N.E.2d 1258
                           ____________

            (1995).   Phinney  gives  further support  to the  magistrate
                      _______

            judge's view  that the limitations period  and discovery rule

            considered in  Riley, a  malpractice case, will  apply here.2
                           _____

            It also lends support to  the present outcome, in that, in  a

            fairly analogous situation involving parental incest, summary

            judgment was awarded absent  plaintiffs' showing of a triable

            issue  as to  whether they  or a  reasonable person  in their

            position would have lacked sufficient notice of the cause  of

            their harm within  the applicable time period.   See Phinney,
                                                             ___ _______

            654 N.E.2d at 81-82.

                      Focusing, as the lower  court properly did, on when

            plaintiff knew or had  sufficient notice of the cause  of her

                                
            ____________________

            2.    Plaintiff's attempt  to  apply  retroactively a  recent
            Massachusetts enactment codifying the discovery rule in cases
            of sexual abuse of a minor  does not carry her far.  Even  if
            Massachusetts  General Laws ch.260,   4C were to apply, as it
            became effective December 17, 1993, after plaintiff filed her
            complaint but  before the  answer was  filed, cf.  Riley, 565
                                                          ___  _____
            N.E.2d  at 788 & n.3 (looking at whether stage of proceedings
            governed  by legislative  change on  tolling had  passed), it
            appears in the present circumstances to set out substantially
            the same standard and criteria announced in Riley. 
                                                        _____

                                         -4-
                                          4

            harm,3  we  agree that  the  record  demonstrates no  triable

            issue over whether such knowledge or notice may have occurred

            only after November 12, 1990  (the relevant date, three years

            before  the  complaint was  filed).   The  record  contains a

            plethora of  undisputed  evidence showing  plaintiff's  early

            awareness of distress resulting from her father's abuse.  She

            filed, withdrew, and later refiled (in October 1990) criminal

            charges against her father.  She manifested  from 1984 onward

            her  strong  desire  to   escape  the  repeated  abuse  (and,

            subsequently, to help her  sister escape the risk  of abuse).

            Her own  suicidal  inclinations in  1984  are linked  in  her

            affidavit  with going  to the  police in  that year  with her

            mother and  sisters to  protest  her father's  conduct.   Her

            psychologist,  Dr.  Wayment,  opined  that   plaintiff  could

                                
            ____________________

            3.   Appellant concedes, as  the magistrate judge found, that
            there is no  dispute over  the first prong  of the  discovery
            rule,  i.e., that plaintiff knew she had been harmed prior to
                   ____
            November  1990.    The  sole  issue  is  whether,  given  Dr.
            Wayment's   and  plaintiff's   affidavits  relating   to  her
            dissociation --  rendering her unable causally  to relate her
            psychological injuries to  her father's conduct  -- plaintiff
            or a reasonable person who had been subject to her experience
            would have lacked sufficient  knowledge until after  November
            12, 1990 that her father caused her injuries.  We believe, in
            this regard,  that the  magistrate judge misspoke  in resting
            her  prong  one  finding  solely  on  plaintiff's remembrance
            before then of "the incestuous acts."  Flanagan, 897 F. Supp.
                                                   ________
            at 642.  The relevant harm referred to in Riley is not simply
                                                      _____
            the  abusive  conduct  itself  but the  psychological  injury
            therefrom.   See Riley, 565  N.E.2d at 786.   Here, appellant
                         ___ _____
            considered suicide  and  manifested other  forms of  distress
            prior to November 1990, making it clear that she was aware of
            the psychological harm prior  to then so as to  satisfy prong
            one of the discovery rule.

                                         -5-
                                          5

            intellectually  understand  the   relationship  between   her

            father's  incest and her feelings, although she did not fully

            associate  emotionally   the  incestuous  conduct   with  her

            feelings until the fall of 1993.

                      Riley  held   that   even  though   emotional   and
                      _____

            psychological barriers  may prevent  a plaintiff  from taking

            action against an abusive  defendant, a plaintiff's knowledge

            of a causal association between  the abuse and the  resulting

            psychological  harm suffices  to trigger  the running  of the

            statute of limitations.   Riley, 565 N.E.2d at 787;  see also
                                      _____                      ________

            Phinney,  654 N.E.2d at 81-82.  We think the magistrate judge
            _______

            did  not  err  in finding  no  triable  issue  here, and  are

            constrained  to agree  with her conclusion  in this  sad case

            that  "[i]n the case at bar, although plaintiff did not fully

            experience the extent of the damage inflicted by  her father,

            she  nevertheless realized  that  her father  was the  likely

            cause of her injuries prior to November 12, 1990."  Flanagan,
                                                                ________

            897 F. Supp. at 643.

                      There is  no merit  in plaintiff's second  argument

            that  the district  court inadequately  performed its  review

            duties because it simply noted its approval on the magistrate

            judge's  report  itself.    Plaintiff  cites  no  caselaw  or

            particular fact supporting her claim and we discern none.    

                      Affirmed.   
                      ________

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