Universal Engineering Corp. v. Perez

• Decision Date: 17 May 1984
• Docket Number: No. 62157,62157
• Citation: 451 So.2d 463
• Parties: UNIVERSAL ENGINEERING CORP., Appellant, v. Pedro Luis PEREZ, et al., Appellees.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

Page 463

451 So.2d 463

UNIVERSAL ENGINEERING CORP., Appellant, v. Pedro Luis PEREZ, et al., Appellees.

No. 62157.

Supreme Court of Florida.

May 17, 1984.

Gerald E. Rosser and Vernis, Bowling, Mantalto, Goodman & Blank, Miami, for appellant.

Edward A. Perse of Horton, Perse & Ginsberg and Carroll, Halberg & Meyerson, Miami, for appellees.

PER CURIAM.

This appeal is from a decision of the Third District Court of Appeal, Perez v. Universal Engineering Corp., 413 So.2d 75 (Fla. 3d DCA 1982), which held section 95.11(3)(c), Florida Statutes (1975), unconstitutional as applied to appellees' causes of action. We have jurisdiction pursuant to article V, section 3(b)(1), Florida Constitution, but we are unable to exercise our jurisdiction for lack of sufficient factual determinations on the record before us. Thus, we remand for further proceedings.

Pennsuco Cement & Aggregates, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Maule Industries, employed appellee Perez from November 1970 to April 1972 and appellee Rodriguez from July 1969 to October 1972. The appellees' jobs consisted of welding manganese and manganese rods onto rock crusher machines, which had been purchased and installed between 1952 and 1958. Perez and Rodriguez contend that they contracted manganese poisoning induced by fumes given off during the welding process, that they became seriously ill in April 1972 and October 1972, respectively, and that the cause of their illness was not determined until a much later date. The record is silent as to the exact date of diagnosis and as to the date at which appellees knew or should reasonably have known their illness was occupationally related. Perez and Rodriguez filed suit against their employers in 1975. They amended their complaints on March 26, 1976, adding Universal Engineering Corporation and Western Knapp Engineering Company as party defendants. Appellees alleged that their injuries resulted from manganese poisoning derived from the use of the crusher machines negligently designed, manufactured, and installed by Universal and Western Knapp.

Universal filed a motion for summary judgment claiming that, since Universal had not been added until March 26, 1976, the actions were barred by the statute of limitations. The trial court granted the motion, and the district court reversed and remanded. Universal appealed the district court decision to this Court. ¹ We are asked to determine whether the district court erred in declaring the statute of repose unconstitutional as applied to appellees' causes of action. ²

A statute of repose should be distinguished from a statute of limitations.

Rather than establishing a time limit within which [an] action must be brought, measured from the time of accrual of the cause of action, these [statute of repose] provisions cut off the right of action after a specified time measured from the delivery of a product or the completion of work. They do so regardless of the time of the accrual of the cause of action or of notice of the invasion of a legal right.

Bauld v. J.A. Jones Construction Co., 357 So.2d 401, 402 (Fla.1978). The statute of repose in issue was contained in the statute of limitations in effect when the actions were filed, section 95.11(3)(c), Florida Statutes (1975), which provided:

(3) WITHIN FOUR YEARS.--

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(c) An action founded on the design, planning, or construction of an improvement to real property, with the time running from the date of actual possession by the owner, the date of abandonment of construction if not completed, or upon completion or termination of the contract between the professional engineer, registered architect, or licensed contractor and his employer; except that when the action involves a latent defect, the time runs from the time the defect is discovered or should have been discovered with the exercise of due diligence. In any event within 12 years after the date of actual possession by the owner, the date of abandonment of construction if not completed, or upon completion or termination of the contract between the professional engineer, registered architect, or licensed contractor and his employer.

That statute was added by chapter 74-382, Laws of Florida, and became effective January 1, 1975. The provisions also contained a savings clause, codified as section 95.022, Florida Statutes (1975), which provided:

This act shall become effective on January 1, 1975, but any action that will be barred when this act becomes effective and that would not have been barred under prior law may be commenced before January 1, 1976, and if it is not commenced by that date, the action shall be barred.

The issue presented to this Court is whether the statute of repose in section 95.11(3)(c) may be constitutionally applied to bar actions which arose after the expiration of the twelve-year repose provision but before the effective date of the statute, so as to invoke the savings clause. ³

This case must be analyzed in terms of our reasoning in Overland Construction Co. v. Sirmons, 369 So.2d 572 (Fla.1979), and its clarification of Bauld v. J.A. Jones Construction Co., 357 So.2d 401 (Fla.1978). In Overland we held that, insofar as section 95.11(3)(c) operates as an absolute bar to actions commenced more than twelve years after events connected with the construction of improvements to real property, it violates article I, section 21 of the Florida Constitution. ⁴ This section provides:

The courts shall be open to every person for redress of any injury, and justice shall be administered without sale, denial or delay.

Thus, for section 95.11(3)(c) to be unconstitutional as applied, it must operate as an absolute bar to bringing an action. If section 95.11(3)(c) only shortens the time period in which the action may be brought to a reasonable amount of time, then the Florida Constitution is not violated. Bauld.

In Overland the plaintiff's cause of action accrued after January 1, 1975, the effective date of the statutory revision and after the running of the twelve-year cap provision of section 95.11(3)(c). Consequently, the action was absolutely barred by the cap provision and the inapplicability of the savings clause's one-year extension period. See also Diamond v. E.R. Squibb & Sons, Inc., 397 So.2d 671 (Fla.1981) (interpreting section 95.031(2), Florida Statutes (1977)). In Bauld the plaintiff's cause of action accrued prior to January 1, 1975, the effective date of the revision, and prior to the running of the twelve-year cap provision of section 95.11(3)(c). Consequently, the action was not absolutely barred because not only did the plaintiff have until the effective date of the statutory revision to file suit but, in addition, the plaintiff had the one-year extension granted by the savings clause. See also Purk v. Federal Press Co., 387 So.2d 354 (Fla.1980) (interpreting section 95.031(2), Florida Statutes (1975)).

It is undisputed that the cause of action accrued after the twelve-year repose provision had run in 1970, but this alone is not sufficient to determine the constitutionality of section 95.11(3)(c). An additional inquiry into whether the cause of action accrued before or after the effective date of the statutory revision, January 1, 1975, so as to invoke the savings clause, is essential. The very purpose of enacting the savings clause was to address the situation in which a plaintiff with an existing cause of action was barred from bringing suit because of the newly enacted statute of limitations. Carpenter v. Florida Central Credit Union, 369 So.2d 935, 937 (Fla.1979).

Because it does not appear in the record when this cause of action accrued, the Court is unable to determine whether this case is controlled by Overland or by Bauld. The rule of law applicable to the case at bar was discussed in Seaboard Air Line Railroad Co. v. Ford, 92 So.2d 160, 164-65 (Fla.1956) (per curiam on rehearing):

Generally, in actions for personal injuries resulting from the wrongful act or negligence of another, the cause of action accrues and the statute begins to run from the time when the injury was first inflicted, and not from the time when the full extent of the damages sustained has been ascertained. Cf. Cristiani v. City of Sarasota, Fla.1953, 65 So.2d 878; 54 C.J.S. Limitations of Actions, § 174, p. 141. The rule of Urie and similar cases dealing with limitations of actions for occupational diseases was developed as an exception to the general rule because of the fact that such diseases may exist unrecognized for a long time and under a judicial determination that the legislature could not have "intended such consequences to attach to blameless ignorance." Urie v. Thompson, supra, 337 U.S. 163, 69 S.Ct. 1018, 1025 . See also the comment of the annotator and cases cited in 11 A.L.R.2d p. 279 et seq., for a discussion of this theory and others developed by the courts to avoid the impact of the general rule in occupational disease cases. The United States Supreme Court said in the Urie case that " 'the afflicted employee can be held to be "injured" only when the accumulated effects of the deleterious substance manifest themselves, ...' " quoting Associated Indemnity Corp. v. Industrial Accident Commission, 124 Cal.App. 378, 12 P.2d 1075, with approval. In City of Miami v. Brooks, supra, 70 So.2d 306, we adopted the theory of the Urie case and applied it in a non-occupational disease case where there was no visible traumatic injury at the time of the negligent act nor other circumstances by which plaintiff could have "been put on notice of his right to a cause of action ..." at that time. And it must be held, under those decisions, that until an occupational disease has manifested itself, there has been no "injury" to start the running of the statute. But we have concluded that when the existence of a disease of the kind here involved (contact dermatitis)...