Mitchell v. Roberts

• Decision Date: 09 August 2022
• Docket Number: 21-4055
• Citation: 43 F.4th 1074
• Parties: Terry MITCHELL, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. Richard Warren ROBERTS, Defendant - Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

43 F.4th 1074

Terry MITCHELL, Plaintiff - Appellant,

v.Richard Warren ROBERTS, Defendant - Appellee.

No. 21-4055

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit.

FILED August 9, 2022

Walter M. Mason of Dewsnup King Olsen Worel Havas Mortensen, Salt Lake City, Utah for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Dick J. Baldwin (Troy L. Booher with him on the brief) of Zimmerman Booher, Salt Lake City, Utah, for Defendant-Appellee.

Before CARSON, BRISCOE, and ROSSMAN, Circuit Judges.

ROSSMAN, Circuit Judge.

In 1981, appellee Richard Warren Roberts was a federal prosecutor preparing for a murder trial in Salt Lake City, Utah. Appellant Terry Mitchell, then a teenager, was a key trial witness for the prosecution. Thirty-five years later, in 2016, Ms. Mitchell sued Mr. Roberts in federal district court in Utah alleging he sexually assaulted her throughout the criminal trial proceedings.

Mr. Roberts moved to dismiss the complaint with prejudice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), contending Ms. Mitchell's claims were time barred. Ms. Mitchell conceded her claims had expired under the original statute of limitations but asserted they were revived when the Utah legislature enacted Utah Code section 78B-2-308(7) ("Revival Statute") in 2016. The Revival Statute permitted certain civil claims against alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse to proceed, even if "time barred as of July 1, 2016," if "brought within 35 years of the victim's 18th birthday, or within 3 years of the effective date of this Subsection (7), whichever is longer." § 78B-2-308(7). Ms. Mitchell asserted her claims were timely filed under the Revival Statute.

At Ms. Mitchell's request, the magistrate judge¹ certified questions to the Utah Supreme Court concerning the validity of the Revival Statute. The Utah Supreme Court accepted the certification request and, after briefing and oral argument, issued a detailed opinion concluding the Utah legislature was prohibited from retroactively reviving time-barred claims in a manner that deprived defendants like Mr. Roberts of a vested statute of limitations defense. Based on the Utah Supreme Court's conclusion that the Revival Statute was unconstitutional, Mr. Roberts again moved to dismiss with prejudice under Rule 12(b)(6). Ms. Mitchell sought voluntary dismissal without prejudice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(2). According to Ms. Mitchell, the Utah Supreme Court had not foreclosed the possibility that the Utah Constitution would be amended to permit legislative revival of time-barred child sexual abuse claims, and on that basis, she proposed a curative condition that would allow her to sue Mr. Roberts if such an amendment came to pass. The magistrate judge rejected Ms. Mitchell's argument and dismissed her complaint with prejudice.

Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.

I. Background

A. Ms. Mitchell sues Mr. Roberts in federal district court in Utah.

In 2016, the Utah legislature passed House Bill 279—amending the statute of limitations at Utah Code § 78B-2-308(7) and creating a window for the revival of time-barred civil claims against alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse. H.B. 279, 61st Leg., 2016 Gen. Sess. (Utah 2016). Through the Revival Statute, the legislature recognized "child sexual abuse is a crime that hurts the most vulnerable in our society," "destroys lives," and that "it takes decades for the healing necessary for a victim to seek redress." § 78B-2-308(1)(a), (e). Where an action would otherwise be time barred "as of July 1, 2016," the Revival Statute allowed it to be "brought within 35 years of the victim's 18th birthday, or within [3] years of the effective date of this Subsection (7), whichever is longer." Id. § 78B-2-308(7). It was signed into law on March 29, 2016, with an effective date of May 10, 2016. See Utah H.B. 279.

On March 16, 2016, before the Revival Statute was enacted, Ms. Mitchell filed a diversity action against Mr. Roberts in federal district court in Utah claiming he sexually assaulted her in 1981.² Mr. Roberts moved to dismiss with prejudice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), arguing Ms. Mitchell's claims were time barred. After the Revival Statute became effective, but before the magistrate judge ruled on the pending motion to dismiss, Ms. Mitchell voluntarily dismissed her action without prejudice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1).

On July 29, 2016, the day after she voluntarily dismissed her first lawsuit, Ms. Mitchell initiated a new federal case in Utah, filing a substantially similar complaint against Mr. Roberts.³ While she conceded her claims against Mr. Roberts were time barred "as of July 1, 2016," § 78B-2-308(7), Ms. Mitchell maintained her case was timely filed under the Revival Statute. Mr. Roberts then moved to dismiss this second lawsuit with prejudice under Rule 12(b)(6). He argued the "new legislation upon which [Ms.] Mitchell rests her entire case"—the Revival Statute—was "invalid under longstanding Utah law." Aplt. App. at 34, 38. Utah law permitted only the extension of limitations periods "while active," Mr. Roberts contended, but prohibited "revival once [the statute of limitations had] expired." Id. at 39. According to Mr. Roberts, Ms. Mitchell's case fell into the latter category, so her claims against him were time barred and "subsequent legislation [did] not alter that inescapable fact." Id. at 41.

Ms. Mitchell opposed Mr. Roberts's motion and, in the alternative, asked the magistrate judge to certify the case to the Utah Supreme Court. In support of certification, Ms. Mitchell observed the Utah Supreme Court had not yet "resolved the precise question of whether the courts must give effect to [the Revival Statute's] clearly stated legislative intent" to revive previously time-barred child sexual abuse claims. Id. at 76 (capitalization omitted). She also argued that "[d]ecisions by the Utah Supreme Court are inconsistent—or at least some are incomplete—regarding the duty of the courts to give effect" to such legislative intent. Id. (capitalization omitted). Mr. Roberts opposed Ms. Mitchell's certification request, contending "state law on the dispositive issue is settled." Supp. App. vol. 1 at 50 (emphasis omitted).

The magistrate judge granted Ms. Mitchell's request and certified two questions to the Utah Supreme Court⁴ : (1) "Can the Utah Legislature expressly revive time-barred claims through a statute?" and (2) "[D]oes the language of Utah Code section 78B-2-308(7), expressly reviving claims for child sexual abuse that were barred by the previously applicable statute of limitations as of July 1, 2016, make unnecessary the analysis of whether the change enlarges or eliminates vested rights?"⁵ Aplt. App. at 106-07. The Utah Supreme Court accepted the certification request and also ordered the parties to submit supplemental briefing on a related question of state constitutional law—whether the Utah Constitution gives the Utah legislature the power to revive time-barred claims.⁶

B. The Utah Supreme Court holds the Revival Statute is unconstitutional.

Three years later, on June 11, 2020, the Utah Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion holding "the Utah Legislature is constitutionally prohibited from retroactively reviving a time-barred claim in a manner depriving a defendant of a vested statute of limitations defense." Mitchell v. Roberts , 2020 UT 34, ¶ 5, 469 P.3d 901, reh'g denied (July 13, 2020). Because the Utah Supreme Court's holding that the Revival Statute was unconstitutional informed the district court's decision to dismiss Ms. Mitchell's case with prejudice, we describe the opinion in detail.

The Utah Supreme Court answered the certified questions by looking first to its precedent, which "foreclosed" Ms. Mitchell's position that the legislature had the "power to vitiate a vested right in a ripened limitations defense." Id. ¶ 10. "Beginning in 1897 and continuing for over a century, [the Utah Supreme Court] has repeatedly stated that the legislature lacks the power to revive a plaintiff's claim in a manner that vitiates a ‘vested’ right of a defendant." Id. ¶ 11. This "vested rights" limitation on the Utah legislative power "is firmly rooted in [Utah] case law" and "has long been extended to the specific vested right asserted by [Mr.] Roberts—the right to retain a statute of limitations defense after a plaintiff's claim has expired under existing law." Id. From In re Handley's Estate , 15 Utah 212, 49 P. 829, 832 (1897), where the Utah Supreme Court first articulated the "vested rights" limitation on legislative power, to Ireland v. Mackintosh , 22 Utah 296, 61 P. 901, 902 (1900), which extended that limitation to the specific right asserted here by Mr. Roberts, the Utah Supreme Court concluded its long-standing precedent "merits respect as a matter of stare decisis ." Id. ¶¶ 11-14 ; see also id. ¶ 35 ("These cases show that founding-era Utahns understood, according to the constitutional orthodoxy of the era, that the Utah Legislature lacked the power to retroactively divest vested rights."). And that precedent made clear the "vested rights" limitation operated as a "hard limitation on the legislative power—a clear prohibition on legislative attempts to vitiate vested rights." Id. ¶ 25.

The Utah Supreme Court further explained the "vested rights" limitation is "consistent with the original understanding of the Utah Constitution." Id. ¶ 30. Early Utahns "viewed such legislative encroachment into the domain of the judiciary as unconstitutional both as a matter of the principle of separation of powers itself and under the due process clause." Id. ¶ 34. The Utah Supreme Court engaged in a historical analysis detailing how original understandings in the era of the framing of the Utah Constitution wove together due process, legislative power, and vested rights:

In the era of the framing of the Utah Constitution, the public understood the principle of "due process," at least in part, as a matter

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