NO NEW BAD FAITH ACTS ALLEGED THAT COULD RE-START THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS PERIOD (Philadelphia Federal)
This case addresses when a bad faith cause of action accrues, or can be re-started, for statute of limitations purposes.
The bad faith statute of limitations is two years. The claim accrues with the initial coverage denial. Repeated denials of the same claim are merely continuations of an existing harm, and do not constitute new actionable events triggering a new statute of limitations period. Only if the subsequent bad faith act is separate, distinct, and unrelated to the original bad faith denial, can a new limitations period begin to run.
In this case, the alleged bad faith conduct occurred in 2011. The present suit was filed in 2019. The court would not accept bald allegations that events “have taken place and continued over a period of years up to the present day” to re-start the statute of limitations, as no facts were alleged “suggesting a basis for claims within the limitations period.” The complaint was dismissed without leave to amend.
Date of Decision: February 1, 2019
Feingold v. Brooks, U. S. District Court Eastern District of Pennsylvania CIVIL ACTION NO. 19-CV-0291, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16606, 2019 WL 415575 (E.D. Pa. Feb. 1, 2019) (Tucker, J.)
