Abels v. Genie Industries, Inc.

202 S.W.3d 99

TERRY ABELS, as Next Friend and Guardian Ad Litem for JERRY HUNT v. GENIE INDUSTRIES, INC.; WHITE ELECTRICAL CONSTRUCTION COMPANY; and RENTAL SERVICES CORPORATION.

No. M2005-02597-SC-R23-CQ.

Supreme Court of Tennessee, at Nashville.

June 7, 2006 Session.

Filed on September 14, 2006.

William E. Godbold, III, and Sean W. Martin, Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Molly Glover and Tracy A. Overstreet, Memphis, Tennessee, for the Petitioner/Defendant Rental Services Corporation a/k/a RSC.

Marty R. Phillips, Bradford D. Box, and James V. Thompson, Jackson, Tennessee, and Steve Beal, Lexington, Tennessee, for the Respondent/Plaintiff, Terry Abels, as next friend and guardian ad litem for Jerry Hunt.

J. Randolph Bibb, Jr., Nashville, Tennessee, and Robert F. Chapski, Knoxville, Tennessee, for the Respondent/Defendant Genie Industries, Inc.

Robert D. Flynn, Memphis, Tennessee, for the Respondent/Defendant White Electrical Construction Company.

Cornelia A. Clark, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which William M. Barker, C.J., E. Riley Anderson, Adolpho A. Birch, JR., and Janice M. Holder, JJ., joined.

OPINION

CORNELIA A. CLARK, JUSTICE.

We accepted two questions of law certified by the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee to determine whether the applicable statute of limitations, Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-104(a)(1) (2000), begins to run against the tort claims of a legally disabled individual once a legal guardian is appointed. We hold that Tennessee's legal disability statute, Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-1-106 (2000), tolls the statute of limitations for legally disabled individuals for so long as the disability of unsound mind remains, regardless whether such individual has had a legal guardian appointed to pursue such claims on his behalf.

Pursuant to Rule 23 of the Tennessee Rules of the Supreme Court, the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee has certified two questions to this Court. These questions arose in the course of a lawsuit brought by Terry Abels ("Abels") as Next Friend and Guardian ad Litem for Jerry V. Hunt ("Hunt") against defendants Genie Industries, Inc. ("Genie"), White Electrical Construction Company ("White Electrical"), and Rental Services Corporation ("RSC").

Background

According to the federal district court's certification order, on July 7, 2003, Hunt sustained severe hypoxic brain injuries in the course and scope of his employment while operating a "man lift" that was designed and manufactured by Genie. On October 16, 2003, the Circuit Court of Hardin County, Tennessee, appointed Hunt's uncle and work supervisor, Abels, as "Guardian Ad Litem" for Hunt. The guardianship apparently was obtained in order to secure approval of a workers' compensation settlement for Hunt. However, the authority granted to Abels pursuant to the circuit court's order includes "full authority to handle Mr. Hunt's financial affairs."

On July 6, 2004, Abels filed a products liability action against Genie on Hunt's behalf in the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee. In doing so, Abels apparently considered himself bound by the one-year statute of limitations set forth in Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-3-104(a)(1) (2000), which provides that actions for injuries to the person "shall be commenced within one (1) year after the cause of action accrued."

On January 3, 2005, approximately eighteen months after Hunt's accident, Abels sought leave of the district court to amend the complaint to add RSC as an additional party defendant.¹ The court permitted the amendment, and on February 8, 2005, Abels filed an amended complaint against RSC. RSC subsequently moved for summary judgment based on the one-year statute of limitations.

The district court did not rule on the motion for summary judgment, finding that its resolution involved determinative issues of state law for which the decisions of this Court "do not appear to provide controlling precedent." Accordingly, it certified the following questions to this Court:

1. Whether Tennessee's "discovery rule" exception to the accrual of a cause of action refers to the knowledge and diligence of the injured person or to the knowledge and diligence of a legal representative who has accepted responsibility for the injured person's tort claims arising out of a single incident?

2. Whether, under Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-1-106, the disability of "unsound mind" is "removed" when the injured person's legal representative accepts responsibility for the injured person's tort claims arising out of a single incident?

We accepted these certified questions. See Tenn. Sup. Ct. R. 23 (2006).

Analysis

I. Legal Disability Statute

Because we find the second certified question to be dispositive of the first, we begin with it. For the reasons that follow, we conclude that the appointment of a legal guardian does not remove an injured person's disability of "unsound mind" under Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-1-106 and that the statute of limitations remains tolled so long as the injured person remains so disabled.

The second certified question asks us to construe the legal disability statute, Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-1-106, to determine whether its provisions toll the statute of limitations for individuals of unsound mind when that person's legal representative accepts responsibility for the injured person's tort claims arising out of a single incident. As noted above, the statute of limitations for actions for injuries to the person is one year. Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-104(a)(1) (2000). However, Tennessee's legal disability statute provides that:

[i]f the person entitled to commence an action is, at the time the cause of action accrued, either under the age of eighteen (18) years, or of unsound mind, such person, or such person's representatives and privies, as the case may be, may commence the action, after the removal of such disability, within the time of limitation for the particular cause of action, unless it exceeds three (3) years, and in that case within three (3) years from the removal of such disability.

Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-1-106 (2000) (emphasis added).

The parties in this case are not contesting before this Court that Hunt was, at the time this action accrued, and still is, of unsound mind. Abels argues that because Hunt has been of unsound mind since his injury, Tennessee's legal disability statute tolls the running of the statute of limitations in this case. RSC contends that Hunt's disability was removed when Abels was appointed Hunt's legal guardian, so that the one-year statute of limitations began running on October 16, 2003.² Our resolution of this dispute depends upon our construction of the legal disability statute.

Initially, we reiterate that

[o]ur approach to statutory construction begins with the statute's language, and if it can end thereSwith our finding of a clear meaning of the Legislature's intentSthen we must stop. "Our search for a statute's purpose begins with the words of the statute itself. If the statute is unambiguous, we need only to enforce the statute as written[,]" with no recourse to the broader statutory scheme, legislative history, historical background, or other external sources of the Legislature's purpose.

Calaway v. Schucker, 193 S.W.3d 509, 516 (Tenn. 2005) (quoting In re Conservatorship of Clayton, 914 S.W.2d 84, 90 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1995)). With respect to the legal disability statute, this Court has previously concluded that "[t]he legislative purpose involved . . . is to declare that statutes of limitation do not begin to run until a person's disability is removed." Arnold v. Davis, 503 S.W.2d 100, 102 (Tenn. 1973). We also agree with our Court of Appeals that "`exceptions to a limitations statute in favor of persons under disability should be strictly construed and never extended beyond their plain import.'" Owen v. Summers, 97 S.W.3d 114, 123 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2001) (quoting Smith v. Grummau-Olsen Corp., 913 F.Supp. 1077, 1083 (E.D.Tenn. 1995)).

As noted by the district court in its certification order, the legal disability statute gives the legal representatives of minor persons and those of unsound mind the right to commence an action "after the removal of such disability." The statute is silent, however, as to the effect of a representative commencing an action before the disability is removed. That is the issue we must now decide.

This Court has not addressed this issue based on the current statutory language found in Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-1-106. However, in Thompson v. Cincinnati, N.O. & T. Pac. Ry. Co., 70 S.W. 612, 613-14 (Tenn. 1902), this Court held, under an earlier version of this statute,³ that a married woman's cause of action was not barred by the applicable statute of limitations even when her husband was capable of bringing a suit on her behalf within the limitations period but did not do so until after the limitations period had run. In so holding, this Court noted that

[t]he wife's injury is the meritorious cause of action, and, in legal effect, it is the action of the wife. If the statute of limitations does not operate to bar her action, this suit is not barred, for the husband has, independently of her, no right of action whatever. In Tennessee the statutes of limitation apply to the cause of action, and are not directed to their mere form.

Id. at 613 (quoting Fink v. Campbell, 70 F. 664, 667-68 (6th Cir. 1895)).

More recently, our Court of Appeals held that a minor's cause of action against a defendant, who was added two years after the original complaint was filed, was not barred by the statute of limitations, even though the minor's legal guardian timely filed the original complaint. Brooks v. Gunn, 667 S.W.2d 499, 501 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1984). The court explained that because the minor was still under the disability of minority under Tennessee Code Annotated section...