Traylor v. Reliance Ins. Co.

715 So. 2d 1253, 1998 WL 501394
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJuly 1, 1998
Docket98-C-1379
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 715 So. 2d 1253 (Traylor v. Reliance Ins. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Traylor v. Reliance Ins. Co., 715 So. 2d 1253, 1998 WL 501394 (La. Ct. App. 1998).

Opinion

715 So.2d 1253 (1998)

Robert TRAYLOR and Amy Traylor, et al.
v.
RELIANCE INSURANCE COMPANY, et al.

No. 98-C-1379.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fourth Circuit.

July 1, 1998.

*1254 Christopher J. Aubert, David J. Schexnaydre, Aubert & Pajares, Metairie, for Relators.

J. Van Robichaux, Jr., Sherry A. King, Chalmette, for Respondents.

Glenn A. Diaz, Chalmette, for Respondent.

Before BYRNES, WALTZER and MURRAY, JJ.

BYRNES, Judge.

This personal injury action arises out of a March 21, 1995 automobile accident. Plaintiffs, Robert Traylor and Amy Traylor, individually and on behalf of their minor child, Brandon Traylor, filed this suit on January 18, 1996, seeking damages incurred as a result of injuries sustained by Mr. Traylor in the accident. Named as defendants were relators, Jeffery Smith, the driver of the other vehicle involved in the accident, his employer, Westinghouse Electric Company, and its insurer, Reliance Insurance Company, along with other defendants, State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, plaintiffs' UM carrier, and Reliance National Indemnity Co., also providing UM coverage for the vehicle driven by Mr. Traylor. On June 18, 1997, plaintiffs filed a First Supplemental and Amending Petition, adding defendants Barriere Construction Company, Inc. and Barriere Construction, L.L.C., against whom defendants had filed a third-party demand.

On February 17, 1998, while trial of the main demand was in progress, the trial court granted leave to Merrie Lee Kraemer to file a petition of intervention on behalf of her minor child, nine-year old Laura Lynn Kraemer, alleging that Laura Lynn Kraemer was the illegitimate, acknowledged child of Mr. Traylor, and praying for damages for loss of consortium. Relators filed a peremptory exception of prescription, which was denied by the trial court in an oral ruling on May 15, 1998. The relators ask this Court to reverse this ruling in their writ application.

Delictual actions are subject to a liberative prescription of one year. La. C.C. art. 3492. If the face of the petition shows that the prescriptive period has elapsed, the plaintiff has the burden of proving prescription has not run. Hoerner v. Wesley-Jensen, Inc., 95-0553, p. 3 (La.App. 4 Cir. 11/20/96), 684 So.2d 508, 510, writs denied, 96-3047, 96-3054 (La.2/7/97), 68 So.2d 501. However, the evidence must be strictly construed against prescription and in favor of maintaining the obligation sought to be extinguished. Id.

Relators aver that, pursuant to LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067, respondent's petition of intervention was filed untimely. LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 provides:

An incidental demand is not barred by prescription or peremption if it was not barred at the time the main demand was filed and is filed within ninety days of date of service of main demand or in the case of a third party defendant within ninety days from service of process of the third party demand.

A petition of intervention is an incidental demand. LSA-C.C.P. art. 1031. LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 applies to all petitions of intervention. Moore v. Gencorp, Inc., 93-0814 (La.3/22/94), 633 So.2d 1268 (reversing this Court's holding in Moore v. Gencorp, Inc., 615 So.2d 1092 (La.App. 4 Cir.1993), that LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 did not apply to incidental demands filed by non-party plaintiffs with independent causes of action). The term "main demand" encompasses both original and amending petitions that relate back to the date of the filing of the original petition pursuant to LSA-C.C.P. art. 1153. Id; Keller v. Townsley, 462 So.2d 264 (La.App. 1 *1255 Cir.1984). LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 has been characterized by this Court as an exemption statute, which exempts any incidental demand from any applicable prescriptive statute whose prescriptive period would accrue during the ninety-day period from the date of service of the main demand or third-party demand. Kelly v. Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District, 380 So.2d 669 (La.App. 4 Cir.1980).

Original plaintiffs' first supplemental and amending petition contains a certificate of service dated June 17, 1997. Ms. Kraemer's intervention was filed on February 17, 1998, over eight months later. Therefore, LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 does not operate to allow Ms. Kraemer to defeat the prescriptive bar of LSA-C.C. 3447.

LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 was created by Act 472 of 1970 in order "to permit, in certain circumstances, the institution of reconventional demands on which prescription had run." Thus, LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 was enacted for the purpose of providing additional opportunities for filing reconventional demands which would not have been available prior to Act 472 of 1970. The purpose of Act 472 of 1970 was not intended to impose new limits on the class of permitted reconventional demands. Act 472 of 1970 was an act of expansion of possibilities, not an act intended to impose limits on existing opportunities. In other words, all reconventional demands that would have been timely prior to the enactment of Act 472 of 1970 remained timely. But, in addition thereto, Act 472 of 1970 created the new class of permitted reconventional demands, i.e., those filed after prescription would normally have run, but within 90 days of the filing of the main demand.[1]

Subsequently, Act 86 of 1974 amended LSA-C.C.P. art. 1067 so that its scope was expanded to encompass not just reconventional demands that might otherwise have prescribed, but also all "prescribed incidental or third party demands." In the case of incidental demands, a grace period is granted of 90 days from service of the main demand, provided that the incidental demand had not prescribed at the time the main demand was filed. Like Act 472 of 1970, Act 86 of 1974, is an act creating expanded possibilities. It was not intended to in any way create new restrictions on the class of timely incidental demands. In other words, all those incidental demands that would have been timely prior to Act 86 of 1974 remain timely; but in addition thereto, Act 86 creates a new class of timely incidental demands. To put it still another way, an incidental demand that might not fall within the grace period of Article 1067, would be permitted if allowable on any other basis.

Therefore, the fact that Article 1067 does not apply in this case (because it is uncontested that the intervention was not filed within ninety days after service of the main demand and the supplemental demand) is not necessarily fatal to the respondent's intervention.

The respondent-intervenor asserts that as Robert Traylor's acknowledged daughter, her claim for loss of consortium arising out of her father's injuries puts her in the same category of plaintiff as Traylor's legitimate son Brandon who asserted a similar claim in the original and supplemental petitions in the main demand. The respondent asserts that: "The respondent intervenor relies upon the Supreme Court decision in Giroir v. South Louisiana Medical Center, Div. of Hospitals, 475 So.2d 1040 (La. 1985), which held that prescription was interrupted on behalf of the intervenors by the timely filing of an original petition by their relatives who were in substantially the same position as to the decedent." Giroir made no such general statement. Giroir was limited to a holding that an amended petition adding an additional party plaintiff after the expiration of the prescriptive period would be allowed under LSA-C.C.P. art. 1153 to relate back to the timely filing of the original petition where the amendment satisfied the following four criteria:

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
715 So. 2d 1253, 1998 WL 501394, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/traylor-v-reliance-ins-co-lactapp-1998.