Murphy v. Merzbacher

• Decision Date: 01 September 1996
• Docket Number: No. 55,55
• Citation: 346 Md. 525,697 A.2d 861
• Parties: Elizabeth MURPHY, et al. v. John J. MERZBACHER, et al. ,
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 525

346 Md. 525

697 A.2d 861

Elizabeth MURPHY, et al. v. John J. MERZBACHER, et al.

No. 55, Sept. Term, 1996.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

July 28, 1997.

Reconsideration Denied Sept. 5, 1997.

Jeffrey P. Shiller (Suder & Suder, P.A.), Baltimore, Wayne M. Willoughby (Robin R. Smith, Janet, Willoughby & Gershon, L.L.C., all on brief), Baltimore, for Appellants.

Robert H. House, Jr. (Gregory L. VanGeison, Anderson Coe & King, L.L.P., on brief), Baltimore, Kevin M. Murphy (Samuel J. Smith, Jr., Carr, Goodson, Lee & Warner, on brief), Washington, DC, for Appellees.

Argued before BELL, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, CHASANOW, KARWACKI, RAKER and WILNER, JJ.

KARWACKI, Judge.

Maryland Code (1974, 1995 Repl.Vol.), § 5-101 of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article, Maryland's general statute of limitations, ordinarily requires a civil lawsuit to be filed within three years from the date the action accrues. Nonetheless, section 5-201(a) of that same Article provides that

"[w]hen a cause of action subject to a limitation under Subtitle 1 of this title accrues in favor of a minor or mental incompetent, that person shall file his action within the lesser of three years or the applicable period of limitations after the date the disability is removed."

We are asked in this appeal whether a defendant can be equitably estopped from asserting limitations when threats by the defendant have allegedly prevented or otherwise frustrated the plaintiff from bringing suit within the applicable limitations period. Without foreclosing that possibility, we nonetheless shall hold that under the circumstances presented in this case, Appellants' claims are barred for a want of timely prosecution.

I.

The genesis of this appeal reaches back nearly twenty years to the 1970's when twelve of the Appellants were students at the Catholic Community Middle School of South Baltimore, Inc. The Archdiocese of Baltimore, Division of Catholic Schools ("Archdiocese"), employed John Joseph Merzbacher as an instructor at that school. According to the Appellants, ¹ Merzbacher, with the constructive, and in some instances, actual knowledge of the Archdiocese, subjected Appellants to a systematic and brutal campaign of sexual, physical, and emotional violence during their tutelage at the Catholic Community Middle School. ² In an effort to conceal his wrongdoing, Merzbacher allegedly threatened his victims and their families with violence and death if the authorities were ever informed of his actions. Appellants concede that the last threat by Merzbacher to any one of them occurred no later than 1980, and that all threats ceased before any of the Appellants reached the age of majority.

In January of 1994, Merzbacher was indicted in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City for the rape and sexual child abuse of Elizabeth Murphy, an Appellant in the case sub judice. On June 8, 1995, a jury convicted Merzbacher of those crimes, and he was sentenced to life imprisonment plus ten years. ³ The Court of Special Appeals affirmed Merzbacher's convictions and sentences. ⁴

On January 6, 1994, Appellant Murphy filed the first of fourteen civil complaints filed by Appellants in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City against Merzbacher and the Archdiocese. Murphy, along with the other Appellants, sought compensatory and punitive damages for various intentional and non-intentional torts resulting from their alleged sexual abuse by Merzbacher.

The Archdiocese responded with a Motion to Dismiss asserting Maryland's three-year statute of limitations. ⁵ Appellants in turn argued that Merzbacher's death threats should equitably estop the Archdiocese from raising limitations as a defense. On September 9, 1994, the circuit court denied Respondent's Motion to Dismiss so that the parties could conduct limited discovery on the issue of whether the Appellants were under continuous duress from the time of the alleged threats through three years prior to the filing of the actions below.

Following discovery, the Archdiocese filed a new Motion to Dismiss, or, in the Alternative, [a Motion] for Summary Judgment, once again pleading limitations as a defense. On October 26, 1995, the circuit court issued a Memorandum and Order granting summary judgment in favor of the Archdiocese, concluding that although threats may estop a defendant from asserting limitations, Appellants' claims were nonetheless barred since Merzbacher's threats ceased long before "the victims reached the age of majority [and] the three year period of limitations period that followed." Judgment was similarly entered in favor of Appellee Merzbacher on November 16, 1995.

Because they contained common issues of law and fact, the court consolidated Appellants' cases for "the purposes of discovery, pre-trial matters, and appellate review." That Order issued on November 21, 1995, and served as a final and joint judgment in favor of Merzbacher and the Archdiocese in all of the Appellants' cases. Appellants then noted a timely appeal to the Court of Special Appeals. We issued a Writ of Certiorari on our own motion before consideration of the cases by the intermediate appellate court. Such other facts as necessary are incorporated into the discussion below.

II.

As this is an appeal from a grant of summary judgment in Appellees' favor, our sole task is to determine whether the trial court was legally correct. Beatty v. Trailmaster, 330 Md. 726, 737, 625 A.2d 1005, 1011 (1993); King v. Bankerd, 303 Md. 98, 111, 492 A.2d 608, 614 (1985). In that regard, summary judgment is appropriate when there is no dispute as to any material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Maryland Rule 2-501; Bowen v. Smith, 342 Md. 449, 454, 677 A.2d 81, 83 (1996).

In assessing the court's actions below, we point out that "ordinary principles governing summary judgment ... continue to apply when the issue on summary judgment is limitations[.]" O'Hara v. Kovens, 305 Md. 280, 304, 503 A.2d 1313, 1325 (1986). If the plaintiff files his or her action beyond the limitations period, it is generally barred, entitling the defendant to judgment as a matter of law.

We have previously observed that a statute of limitations is nothing more than "the legislature's judgment about the reasonable time needed to institute [a] suit." Doe v. Maskell, 342 Md. 684, 689, 679 A.2d 1087, 1089 (1996). As the United States Supreme Court acknowledged over fifty years ago:

"Statutes of limitation find their justification in necessity and convenience rather than in logic. They represent expedients, rather than principles. They are practical and pragmatic devices to spare the courts from litigation of stale claims, and the citizen from being put to his defense after memories have faded, witnesses have died or disappeared, and evidence has been lost. (Internal citation omitted). They are by definition arbitrary, and their operation does not discriminate between the just and unjust claim, or the voidable and unavoidable delay. They have come into the law not through the judicial process but through legislation. They represent a public policy about the privilege to litigate."

Chase Securities Corp. v. Donaldson, 325 U.S. 304, 314, 65 S.Ct. 1137, 1142, 89 L.Ed. 1628, 1635 (1945). Thus, when plaintiffs imprudently prolong their decision to bring an action, these statutes act as a complete bar to their claims, relieving potential defendants from the pending burden. Doe, 342 Md. at 689-90, 679 A.2d at 1089-90.

Ordinarily, our statute of limitations begins to "accrue" on the date of the wrong. The assumption, of course, is that "a potential tort plaintiff is immediately aware that he [or she] has been wronged [and] is therefore put on notice that the statute of limitations" is running. Harig v. Johns-Manville Products, 284 Md. 70, 76, 394 A.2d 299, 303 (1978). The nature of some torts, however, belies this assumption. Thus, when stealth, subterfuge, or other difficulties of detection leave a plaintiff "blamelessly ignorant" of the facts and circumstances legally entitling him or her to relief, the statute does not begin to run against the plaintiff, unless he or she knows, or through the exercise of reasonable diligence should know, of the wrong. Doe, supra, 342 Md. at 690, 679 A.2d at 1090 (quoting Poffenberger v. Risser, 290 Md. 631, 637, 431 A.2d 677, 681 (1981)); Hecht v. Resolution Trust Corp., 333 Md. 324, 334, 635 A.2d 394, 399 (1994). This so-called "discovery rule" is not so much an exception to the statute of limitations, as it is a recognition that the Legislature, in employing the word "accrues" in § 5-101 never intended to close our courts to plaintiffs inculpably unaware of their injuries. Harig, supra, 284 Md. at 80, 394 A.2d at 305 (quoting Urie v. Thompson, 337 U.S. 163, 69 S.Ct. 1018, 93 L.Ed. 1282 (1949) (construing statute of limitations within Federal Employers' Liability Act and holding unreasonable and inequitable notion that action accrues on the date of the last known exposure to an inherently unknowable harm)); see also Hecht, supra, 333 Md. at 333, 635 A.2d at 399 (when limitations are at issue, it is necessary to judicially determine when accrual occurred to trigger the operation of the statute). ⁶

Otherwise, we have consistently held that our statutes of limitations are to be strictly construed, and absent a legislative creation of an exception, we " 'will not allow any implied or equitable exception to be engrafted upon it.' " Garay v. Overholtzer, 332 Md. 339, 359, 631 A.2d 429, 431 (1993) (quoting Booth Glass Co. v. Huntingfield Corp., 304 Md. 615, 623, 500 A.2d 641, 645 (1985)); Walko Corp. v. Burger Chef, 281 Md. 207, 210-11, 378 A.2d 1100, 1101-02 (1977) (traditional rule concerning tolling of statutes of limitations can be fairly termed one of strict construction); McMahan v. Dorchester Fert. Co., 184 Md. 155, 160, 40 A.2d 313, 315-16 (1944).

III.

Appellants endeavor to persuade us that...