Turner v. Kight

WILNER, J. The question before us is whether petitioner’s complaint was erroneously dismissed by the Circuit Court for Montgomery County on the ground that the causes pled were barred by limitations. That question hinges on the proper construction to be given to 28 U.S.C. § 1367 (d), which provides for the tolling of State statutes of limitations with respect to State-law claims (i) that are brought in a U.S. District Court, (ii) that are within the “supplemental jurisdiction” of that court, but (iii) over which the court eventually declines to exercise jurisdiction. We interpret § 1367(d) differently than did the Circuit Court and the Court of Special Appeals. ¹⁷⁰ BACKGROUND On May 15, 2001, petitioner filed an 19-count complaint in U.S. District Court against Montgomery County, the county sheriff, several assistants in the sheriffs office, and officials and employees of the county detention center, all based on certain events that occurred on April 19 and April 21, 2000. Twelve counts of her complaint were brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 and alleged violations of petitioner’s Federal Constitutional rights; seven counts were based on rights afforded by the Maryland Constitution or by Maryland common law.

The details of the events complained of are not especially germane to this appeal, and it will suffice to say that all of the claims arose from the execution of an arrest warrant issued by a Maryland court and the treatment of petitioner once she was in custody. On March 26, 2002, the District Court filed a Memorandum Opinion and Order in which it entered summary judgment in favor of the defendants on ten of the Federal claims, dismissed the remaining two, declined to exercise jurisdiction over the seven pendant State-law claims, and directed the clerk to close the case. On April 5, however, petitioner filed a timely motion for reconsideration which, on August 7, 2002, the court granted as to one Federal-law count against one defendant but otherwise denied. In its Order, the court directed the clerk to reopen the case.

On August 20, 2003, the court filed a Memorandum Opinion and Order granting the defendants’ renewed motion for summary judgment on the one count under reconsideration. That produced another motion for reconsideration by petitioner which, on December 22, 2003, the court denied. 1 On January 15, 2004. petitioner filed an appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Although the briefs filed in the Federal appellate court are not in the record before us, it appears from the Opinion of that ¹⁷¹ court that the appeal concerned the judgments entered on petitioner’s Federal claims. Finding no error with respect to those judgments, the court, on January 7, 2005, filed an Opinion affirming them.

Unhappy with that result, petitioner moved for a rehearing en banc, which, on March 8, 2005, the court denied. The appellate mandate affirming the District Court judgments was issued March 16, 2005, and was docketed in the District Court on March 21. That mandate terminated the Federal action. The action now before us, which the parties seem to agree is a repetition of the State-law claims that were filed in the Federal court, was filed in the Circuit Court for Montgomery County on March 11, 2005. 2 Some of the defendants in the current action have not been served.

Those who were served filed or joined in a motion to dismiss based on limitations. The limitations argument presented by those defendants was essentially as follows: (1) the applicable statute of limitations with respect to petitioner’s claims is three years (Maryland Code, § 5-101 of the Cts. & Jud. Proc. Article), (2) the causes of action here arose in April, 2000, (3) this action was not filed until March, 2005, long after the period of limitations expired, (4) Md. Rule 2-101(b) provides, in relevant part, that, if a State-law action is filed in U.S. District Court and that court declines to exercise jurisdiction over it, an action filed in a Maryland circuit court within 30 days after entry of the order of dismissal by the Federal District Court shall be treated as timely filed, (5) this action was not filed in the Circuit Court within 30 days after dismissal of the claims by the U.S. District Court, and (6) the action was therefore not timely under the Rule. ¹⁷² Petitioner’s response was based not on a construction of Rule 2-101(b), but on 28 U.S.C. § 1367 (d), which she argued had the effect of interrupting the running of the statute of limitations from the time the action was filed in Federal court (May 15, 2001) until 30 days after the March 16, 2005 appellate court mandate, and that, as a result, less than thirteen months had actually run on the statute.

The Circuit Court rejected that construction of § 1367(d), concluded that the statute of limitations continued to run and had expired while the case was pending in the U.S. District Court, that petitioner’s only safety net was the 30-day window commencing when the claims were dismissed by the District Court, and that she failed to meet that requirement. Upon that analysis, the court dismissed the actions against those defendants who had been served and denied a motion for reconsideration. Upon a consent motion, the court purported to enter a final judgment with respect to the served defendants under Md. Rule 2-602, apparently on the theory that, absent such an order, an appeal could not proceed because there remained several unserved defendants. 3 In a reported opinion, the Court of Special Appeals agreed with the trial court’s conclusion that § 1367(d) does not suspend the running of the statute of limitations, but merely provides that if the period of limitations expires while the case is pending in a U.S. District Court, the period is extended until 30 days after dismissal of the claims by the District Court. Turner v. Kight, 178 Md.App. 1 , 938 A.2d 863 (2007).

We granted certiorari to consider three issues: ¹⁷³ (1) Whether § 1367(d) serves (i) to suspend the running of limitations during the period that the State-law claims are pending in Federal court, so that, when those claims are dismissed, the plaintiff has as much time remaining as he or she had when the claims were filed in Federal court (plus 30 days), or (ii) merely to extend the limitations period until 30 days after the claims are dismissed if the period otherwise expires while the Federal action was pending; (2) Whether the 30-day grace period commences when the State-law claims are dismissed by the U.S. District Court or when all Federal proceedings that may affect them, including appellate proceedings, are concluded; and (3) Whether Md. Rule 2—101(b) can be read in harmony with § 1367(d). 4 We shall conclude that § 1367(d) does, indeed, suspend the running of limitations and does not merely extend the period, that the suspension remains in effect until 30 days after all Federal proceedings, including appellate proceedings, are concluded, and that Rule 2-101(b) can be read in harmony with § 1367(d), as so construed. SECTION 1367 28 U.S.C. § 1367 was enacted as part of the Judicial Improvements Act of 1990. Although we shall comment further on the legislative history of that section, it will suffice at this point to note only that the section was intended to codify (and, to some extent, modify) existing case law regarding the extent to which a U.S. District Court, when presented in a civil action with a claim that is within its original jurisdiction, coupled "with a claim that is not otherwise within its jurisdiction, could exercise “pendent,” or “ancillary,” or “supplemental” jurisdiction over the latter if it arose from the same conduct as the former. 5 Section 1367 contains four operative ¹⁷⁴ subsections. We are concerned with three of them — subsections (a), (c), and (d). 6 Subsection (a), which provides for the grant of supplemental jurisdiction, states, in relevant part, that in any civil action over which the U.S. District Courts have original jurisdiction, they “shall have supplemental jurisdiction over all other claims that are so related to claims in the action within such original jurisdiction that they form part of the same case or controversy under Article III of the United States Constitution.” Subsection (c) specifies four circumstances under which the District Court may decline to exercise that supplemental jurisdiction, one of which is that the court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction.

That is what occurred in this case. 7 Subsection (d) — the section at issue ¹⁷⁵ here — provides, in relevant part, that “[t]he period of limitations for any claim asserted under subsection (a) ... shall be tolled while the claim is pending and for a period of 30 days after it is dismissed unless State law provides for a longer tolling period.” The first question before us is what Congress meant when it declared that the period of limitations “shall be tolled.” The second is what it meant by “while the claim is pending.” The rules governing the construction of Federal statutes are well-established. The preeminent canon requires the court to “presume that [the] legislature says in a statute what it means and means in a statute what it says there.” BedRoc Ltd., LLC v. U.S., 541 U.S. 176, 183 , 124 S.Ct. 1587, 1593 , 158 L.Ed.2d 338, 345 (2004), quoting from Conn. Nat'l.Bank v. Germain, 503 U.S. 249 , 112 S.Ct. 1146 , 117 L.Ed.2d 391 . 253-54, 503 U.S. 249 , 112 S.Ct. 1146, 1149 , 117 L.Ed.2d 391, 397 (1992). If “the intent of Congress is clear and unambiguously expressed by the statutory language at issue, that would be the end of our analysis.” Zuni Public School Dist.

No. 89 v. Department of Educ., 550 U.S. 81 , 127 S.Ct. 1534, 1543 , 167 L.Ed.2d 449, 461 (2007); CSX Transp., Inc. v. Georgia State Bd. of Equalization, — U.S. —, 128 S.Ct. 467, 474 , 169 L.Ed.2d 418, 429 (2007). On the other hand, the interpretation of a word or phrase as used in a statute is not always governed by a dictionary definition of the word in isolation, but “depends upon reading the whole statutory text, considering the purpose and context of the statute, and consulting any precedents or authorities that inform the analysis.” Dolan v. U.S. Postal Service, 546 U.S. 481, 486 , 126 S.Ct. 1252, 1257 , 163 L.Ed.2d 1079, 1087-88 (2006). Extrinsic materials, such as legislative history, “have a role in statutory interpretation only to the extent they shed a reliable light on ¹⁷⁶ the enacting Legislature’s understanding of otherwise ambiguous terms.” Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Allapattah Services, Inc., supra, 545 U.S. at 568, 125 S.Ct. at 2626, 162 L.Ed.2d at 526-27. We have applied these same principles in construing Maryland statutes.

See Comptroller v. Science Applications, 405 Md. 185, 198 , 950 A.2d 766, 773 (2008). Tolling The threshold question is whether, in the context of the issue before us, the phrase in § 1367(d) that the period of limitations “shall be tolled while the claim is pending” has a clear meaning that must be applied or is ambiguous and thus requires interpretation. We have regarded statutory language as ambiguous if it has more than one reasonable interpretation. Anderson v. The Gables, 404 Md. 560, 572 , 948 A.2d 11, 19 (2008); Barbre v. Pope, 402 Md. 157, 173 , 935 A.2d 699, 709 (2007); Green v. Carr Glass, 398 Md. 512, 522 , 921 A.2d 235, 241 (2007).

Unquestionably, under that test, the language is ambiguous. Most of the courts that have been called upon to construe the meaning of “tolled” as used in the context of statutes of limitations, including under § 1367(d), have recognized that the term can have more than one meaning. The Supreme Court gave the clearest recognition of that in Chardon v. Fumero Soto, 462 U.S. 650, 652, n. 1 , 103 S.Ct. 2611, 2614, n. 1 , 77 L.Ed.2d 74, 78, n. 1 (1983): “ ‘Tolling effect’ refers to the method of calculating the amount of time available to file suit after the tolling has ended. The statute of limitations might merely be suspended; if so, the plaintiff must file within the amount of time left in the limitations period.

If the limitations period is renewed, then the plaintiff has the benefit of a new period as long as the original. It is also possible to establish a fixed period such as six months or one year during which the plaintiff may file suit, without regard to the length of the original limitations period or the amount of time left when tolling began.” See also Philip Morris v. Christensen, 394 Md. 227, 262-65 , 905 A.2d 340, 361-63 (2006); Ryan v. Roman Catholic Bishop ¹⁷⁷ of Providence, 941 A.2d 174, 180, n. 12 (R.I.2008): (“Depending on the context, the word ‘tolling’ can have various meanings in legal writing”). Several of the cases dealing with the application of § 1367(d) acknowledge, tacitly or directly, that the phrase in question could be construed in different manners, and, indeed, the courts have split on what the proper interpretation should be. If the learned appellate judges around the country cannot agree on the meaning and application of the phrase, it cannot be said to have only one reasonable interpretation.

In the most recent exposition of this point, Goodman v. Best Buy, Inc., 755 N.W.2d 354 (Minn.App.2008), the Minnesota court concluded that three different interpretations appear, at least initially, to be possible. First, citing Chard,on, the court noted that the statutory language “could mean that section 1367(d) would ‘annul’ the state limitations period completely and replace it with a fixed period: the 30-day period after federal dismissal.” 755 N.W.2d at 356-57 . That is, in essence, a substitution approach: a Federal statute of limitations is substituted for the State statute. Alternatively, it might mean that § 1367 “would only toll the expiration of the state limitations period.” Id.

That interpretation, it said, “treats that period in the statute — the federal claim period plus thirty days — as a single span of time. If the state limitations period runs out during that span, the thirtieth day after dismissal becomes the new deadline.” Id. at 357-58. That would appear to be an extension approach: if the limitations period under State law expires during the pendency of the Federal action, it is simply extended until the 30th day after dismissal of the pendent claims. As the Minnesota court observed, that would produce the same result as the first approach.

The third possibility is that the “shall be tolled” language means that “the state limitations period is suspended — i.e., the clock is stopped and the time is not counted — while the federal court is considering the claim and for thirty days after the claim is dismissed.” Id. at 357-58. That is a suspension approach: upon dismissal of the pendent claims, the plaintiff ¹⁷⁸ would have whatever time was left under the State statute of limitations when the action was filed in Federal court plus 30 days. All three of these alternative interpretations have been presented to the courts, and, as noted, the courts are not in agreement as to which is the proper reading. The intermediate appellate courts of North Carolina and New Jersey, one intermediate appellate court in California, and the Supreme Court of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (a U.S. Territory) have clearly opted for the extension approach and rejected the suspension alternative.

See Huang v. Ziko, 132 N.C.App. 358 , 511 S.E.2d 305 (1999); Estate of Fennell v. Stephenson, 137 N.C.App. 430 , 528 S.E.2d 911 (2000); Harter v. Vernon, 139 N.C.App. 85 , 532 S.E.2d 836 (2000), appeal dismissed and disc. review denied, 353 N.C. 263 , 546 S.E.2d 97 (2000), cert. denied, 532 U.S. 1022 , 121 S.Ct. 1962 , 149 L.Ed.2d 757 (2001); Berke v. Buckley Broadcasting Corp., 359 N.J.Super. 587 , 821 A.2d 118 (2003), cert. denied, 177 N.J. 571 , 832 A.2d 322 (2003); Kolani v. Gluska, 64 Cal.App.4th 402 , 75 Cal.Rptr.2d 257 (1998); Juan (Zhang) v. Commonwealth, 2001 WL 34883536 (N.M.I.2001). With no discussion, the Supreme Court of Alabama and an intermediate appellate court in Florida appear to have applied an extension theory as well. See Weinrib v. Duncan, 962 So.2d 167 (Ala.2007); Dahl v. Eckerd Family Youth Alternatives, Inc., 843 So.2d 956 (Fla.App.2d Dist.2003). That, of course, is the approach adopted by the Court of Special Appeals in this case.

Three courts — in Minnesota, California, and Pennsylvania— have opted for the suspension approach. See Goodman v. Best Buy, Inc., supra, 755 N.W.2d 354 ; Bonifield v. County of Nevada, 94 Cal.App.4th 298 , 114 Cal.Rptr.2d 207 (2001); and Oleski v. Department of Public Welfare, 822 A.2d 120 (Pa. Cmwlth.2003). Given these disparate interpretations, we must try to discern, as best we can, what Congress intended.

To do that, we shall consider the reasoning of the courts that have already addressed the issue, how tolling has been construed in ¹⁷⁹ related contexts, and what insights may properly be gained from looking at the legislative history of § 1367(d). To the extent that the courts provided any analysis, the ones that have adopted the extension approach have done so by regarding § 1367(d) as a form of equitable tolling, even though it is statutorily based, and concluding that the extension approach provides the most appropriate balance, in that it suffices to serve the Congressional purpose of preserving pendent State-law claims from dismissal under State statutes of limitations and constitutes the least intrusion on State law. The Kolani court found the suspension approach to be unreasonable: “Such a construction is not needed to avoid forfeitures, because 30 days is ample time for a diligent plaintiff to refile his claims and keep them alive. Further, such a construction does significant harm to the statute of limitations policy.” Kolani v. Gluska, supra, 64 Cal.App.4th at 410 , 75 Cal.Rptr.2d 257 .

Similarly, the New Jersey court in Berke expressed the view that “[d]espite its ambiguous use of the word ‘tolling,’ we do not believe that the federal statute intends a result that would permit a gross protraction of the limitations period in clear contravention of the underlying policy of statutory limitations on the time for bringing suit.” Berke v. Buckley Broadcasting Corp., supra, 821 A.2d at 123 . That view also drove the North Carolina decisions. In Huang v. Ziko, supra, 132 N.C.App. 358 , 511 S.E.2d 305, 308 , the lead case in that State, the court observed that the suspension approach “is contrary to the policy in favor of prompt prosecution of legal claims.” The Minnesota court in Goodman , in adopting the contrary suspension approach, did so by a process of elimination based on the structure of § 1367(d). The extension approach, it said, would apply only if the period allowable under the State statute of limitations expired while the action was pending in Federal court: “if the state deadline does not fall during that span of time, the state period of limitations is deemed to have ¹⁸⁰ continued running, unaffected by section 1367(d).” Goodman v. Best Buy, Inc., supra, 755 N.W.2d at 357-58 .

Tolling, if defined in that manner, would occur only when a particular condition is met — expiration of the limitations period during the pendency of the Federal action. The court noted, however, that the tolling provided for in § 1367(d) is not conditional. The statute says that the period of limitations “shall be tolled” and thus requires tolling in every ease. As a matter of statutory construction, therefore, § 1367(d) cannot be read as adopting an extension approach.

The court then concluded that the substitution approach also could not be squared with the statute. If Congress intended that, it would have designated a specific moment in time at which the substitution was to occur, but it did not do so. The statute does not say that any new Federal statute of limitations is to commence when the action is filed in Federal court or upon the filing of the Federal action, but simply tolls limitations while the action is pending and for 30 days thereafter, suggesting merely the suspension of an on-going, existing period of limitations. The Bonifield court, rejecting the extension approach of its sister court in Kolani , relied more on the generic meaning of “tolling,” as defined in an earlier California case.

In that case, Woods v. Young, 53 Cal.3d 315 , 279 Cal.Rptr. 613 , 807 P.2d 455, 461 (1991), the California Supreme Court observed that “[t]olling maybe analogized to a clock that is stopped and then restarted” and that “[w]hatever period of time that remained when the clock is stopped is available when the clock is restarted.” Following that view, the court in Bonifield concluded: “To toll the statute of limitations period means to suspend the period, such that the days remaining begin to be counted after the tolling ceases.... Therefore, by tolling the statute of limitations ‘while the claim is pending [in federal court] and for a period of 30 days after it is dismissed unless State law provides a longer tolling period’ (italics added), section 1367(d) operates at a minimum as follows: The days left in the statute of limitations period at the time ¹⁸¹ the federal claim was filed begin to run after the tolling ceases, i.e., on the 31st day after the federal claim is dismissed.” Bonifield v. County of Nevada, supra, 94 Cal.App.4th at 303-04 , 114 Cal.Rptr.2d 207 . Bonifield’,s view of the more commonly applied conception of tolling is correct. It is the approach taken by Black’s Law Dictionary (8th Ed.2004) which defines “tolling statute” as “[a] law that interrupts the running of a statute of limitations in certain situations, as when the defendant cannot be served with process in the forum jurisdiction.” Id. at 1525.

It was the approach taken by the Supreme Court in Chardon v. Soto, supra, 462 U.S. 650 , 103 S.Ct. 2611 , 77 L.Ed.2d 74 , dealing with whether a Puerto Rico statute of limitations was merely suspended or began to run anew following the denial of class certification in a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 class action. The Court there construed the word “tolling” to mean that “during the relevant period, the statute of limitations ceases to run.” Id. at 652, n. 1 , 103 S.Ct. at 2614, n. 1 , 77 L.Ed.2d at 78, n. 1 . See also American Pipe & Construction Co. v. Utah, 414 U.S. 538, 554 , 94 S.Ct. 756, 766 , 38 L.Ed.2d 713, 727 (1974); Crown, Cork & Seal Co. v. Parker, 462 U.S. 345, 353-54 , 103 S.Ct. 2392, 2397-98 , 76 L.Ed.2d 628, 635-36 (1983); Ball v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 34 F.Supp.2d 424 (S.D.Miss.1998). We have followed that approach as well.

See Philip Morris v. Christensen, supra, 394 Md. at 264 , 905 A.2d at 362 and Bertonazzi v. Hillman, 241 Md. 361 , 216 A.2d 723 (1966). The point made by the Kolani court, that an extension approach is entirely satisfactory to avoid forfeitures and that a suspension approach is not necessary to achieve