Statute of Repose

Published on: August 22, 2016

The Statute of Repose Defeats Claim of Terra Museum

The Terra Museum sued its former attorneys, DLA Piper, for legal malpractice arising out of a real estate deal gone bad. Terra claimed that, due to a drafting error, it was required to pay the other party to the real estate deal millions more than it should have had to pay. The Statute of Repose gives a client six years to sue the attorney for malpractice. The Statute of Repose starts to run when the attorney commits the negligent act, not when the client discovers the error. The court explained that Terra had opportunities to file suit during the

The court explained that Terra had opportunities to file suit during the six-year repose period. The court rejected an argument that the repose period does not begin to run until the transaction was completed.

¶ 33 We conclude that the event giving rise to Terra’s injuries occurred on May 29, 2007, when Terra and NM Project executed the first amendment and chose BOMA 96 as the method of measuring the retail parcel without the exclusionary language.Fricka v. Bauer, 309 Ill. App. 3d 82, 88 (1999) (“The plain language of the statute requires filing of the lawsuit within six years of the acts or omissions that form the basis for the complaint.”). The measurements of the rentable area under the BOMA 96 standards, without excluding the common space, resulted in the increases of the retail parcel space, which required Terra to engage in arbitrations to dispute the measurements, incur the related attorney fees and expenses and make the retail parcel credit payment at the closing. Terra’s asserted injuries directly flowed from DLA’s allegedly negligent omissions and acts as to the first amendment.

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Published on: June 12, 2016

Illinois Appellate Court Rules Claim Against Corporate Lawyers Is Time-Barred

By The Clinton Law Firm

This is another decision affirming, as time-barred, a legal malpractice case. Plaintiffs alleged that they hired Vedder Price to represent them in a commercial real estate transaction in 2003. Plaintiffs signed personal guarantees. The plaintiffs alleged that the lawyer defendants failed to advise them that one of other parties to the venture had signed a limited version of the personal guarantee. Plaintiffs claimed that had they known of the limited version of the guarantee they would not have signed the loan documents. Plaintiffs also alleged that the lawyer defendants failed to notify them that a transfer of a 10% interest in the project to Benjamin Nummy triggered a default under the loan documents.

It was undisputed that the lawyers gave the plaintiffs a complete copy of all the documents signed by all parties in 2003. In 2012, the bank notified the bank that the 2003 transfer to Nummy violated the loan documents and declared a default and sued for foreclosure.

Plaintiffs sued Vedder Price in 2014. The case was dismissed on statute of repose grounds (the alleged negligent act occurred more than 6 years before the lawsuit was filed). Plaintiffs alleged fraudulent concealment but this claim was rejected because the alleged fraudulent concealment consisted of the same allegations that supported the negligence claim. In other words there were no allegations that the lawyers took any action after the transaction to cover up their alleged mistake.

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Published on: July 4, 2013

District Court Dismisses Divorce Malpractice Claim

By The Clinton Law Firm

VALUKAS v. BOTTI MARINACCIO, LTD, Dist. Court, ND Illinois 2013 – Google Scholar.

This is a decision dismissing a divorce malpractice claim on statute of limitations grounds. The plaintiff, James Valukas, hired the defendant law firm to represent him in his divorce. Valukas claimed that the law firm negligently drafted a marital settlement agreement, allowing his ex-wife to make a claim for a portion of the payout on certain stock options.

Defendant raised a statute of repose defense, arguing that the alleged error occurred outside of the limitations period. The statute of repose bars any claim against an attorney that occurred more than 6 years prior to the filing of the lawsuit.

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