Hewczuk v. Sambor, Civ. A. No. 91-6562.
| Decision Date | 29 September 1992 |
| Docket Number | Civ. A. No. 91-6562. |
| Citation | 803 F. Supp. 1063 |
| Parties | Joan Wenning HEWCZUK v. Raymond SAMBOR, and Francis Sambor, h/w. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania |
Nancy D. Wasser, Philadelphia, Pa., for plaintiff.
Wilbur H. Seitzinger, Jr., Seitzinger Babib & Allen, Philadelphia, Pa., for defendants.
Plaintiff brought this action to recover damages which, she alleges, were caused when the defendants sexually molested her during her early childhood, when she was in their foster care. The defendants have filed a motion for summary judgment, seeking dismissal on the ground that the claims are time-barred by the applicable (Pennsylvania) two-year statute of limitations. 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 5524. The plaintiff asserts that the statute was tolled, and did not begin to run until December 1990 or January 1991 when a miscarriage, and psychotherapy associated with problems she was experiencing at that time, brought her repressed memories of the earlier incidents to her consciousness for the first time. Thus, in ruling on the pending motion, I am required to predict whether the Pennsylvania Supreme Court would decide that the "discovery rule" applies to the facts of this case.
In a somewhat similar situation, my colleague Judge Van Artsdalen undertook a comprehensive review of the state and federal cases on this subject and, in a thorough and scholarly opinion, concluded that the Pennsylvania courts would not permit equitable tolling of the limitations period in childhood sexual-abuse cases. Baily v. Lewis, 763 F.Supp. 802 (E.D.Pa.1991).
As set forth in Judge Van Artsdalen's opinion, courts have dealt with two different types of fact-situations in this area: (1) where the plaintiff was aware of the tortious act at the time it occurred, but did not learn, until attaining adulthood, that the physical and psychological problems then being experienced had been caused by the earlier trauma; and (2) cases in which plaintiff's memory of the trauma was entirely repressed, and plaintiff had no conscious awareness of it until much later in life. Judge Van Artsdalen's survey revealed that a substantial majority of state courts have declined to apply the discovery rule to cases in the first category (Indiana, Montana and California; contra, North Dakota and Wisconsin). In the second type of case, a somewhat larger number of states would permit equitable tolling under the discovery rule (California, Michigan, Illinois, Washington (by statute); contra, Nevada and, perhaps, Florida).
Courts which apply the discovery rule reason that, even though a plaintiff's physical or mental disability does not ordinarily toll the statute, where the inability to discover the trauma is due to the nature of the original injury itself, the statute is tolled; in such circumstances, it is the tortfeasor who caused both the original harm and the inability to discover.
I find this reasoning entirely persuasive, and I believe the Pennsylvania Supreme Court would apply the discovery rule in the circumstances of this case.
I hasten to assert that this view can readily be reconciled with the result reached by Judge Van Artsdalen in Baily v. Lewis. In all such cases, the running of the statute is not tolled unless it is made to appear that plaintiff's lack of knowledge was objectively reasonable — i.e., that a reasonably diligent person, similarly situated, would not have discovered the injury. In Baily, the alleged sexual abuse consisted of a series of homosexual acts spanning a five-year period; plaintiff was 12 years old when the misconduct began, and 17 when it ended. The alleged tortfeasor was a family friend, and not someone...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Dalrymple v. Brown
...of limitations. Id. at 810-11. Conversely, another judge of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District, in Hewczuk v. Sambor, 803 F.Supp. 1063 (E.D.Pa.1992), denied a motion for summary judgment, holding instead that, in order to prevent an inequitable result, the courts of Pennsyl......
-
Doe v. Roe
...given that the intentional act of the tortfeasor caused both the damage and the repression of memory. See Hewczuk v. Sambor, 803 F.Supp. 1063, 1065 (E.D.Pa.1992). To hold otherwise would be to effectively reward the perpetrator for the egregious nature of his conduct and the severity of the......
-
Logerquist v. Danforth
...have an opportunity to invoke the discovery rule. A number of other courts have reached that conclusion. See, e.g., Hewczuk v. Sambor, 803 F.Supp. 1063 (E.D.Pa.1992) (applying Pennsylvania law); Hoult v. Hoult, 792 F.Supp. 143, 145 (D.Mass.1992) (applying Massachusetts law); Johnson v. John......
-
Doe v. First United Methodist Church
...242 N.J.Super. 195, 576 A.2d 316; Franke v. Geyer (1991), 209 Ill.App.3d 1009, 154 Ill.Dec. 710, 568 N.E.2d 931; Hewczuk v. Sambor (E.D.Pa.1992), 803 F.Supp. 1063; and Johnson v. Johnson (N.D.Ill.1988), 701 F.Supp. 1363. Some of the cases wherein the discovery rule has been applied to toll ......
-
Therapists' liability to the falsely accused for inducing illusory memories of childhood sexual abuse - current remedies and a proposed statute.
...and of patients electing psychotherapy are female. The gender designation of the therapist will vary. (9) See, eg., Hewczuk v. Sambor, 803 F. Supp. 1063 (E.D. Pa. 1992) (applying Pennsylvania law); Hoult v. Hoult, 792 F. Supp. 143,145 (D. Mass. 1992) (applying Massachusetts law); Johnson v.......