Third Department Issues Another Decision on Extension of Statute of Limitations in Lead Paint Action

The statute of limitations for the commencement of a personal injury action, or the amount time after receiving an injury as a result of a negligent act in which you have to file a claim, is generally three years. In the event that you are a minor, that statute does not begin to run until you are 18 years of age, extending the time to file a claim until you are 21 years old.

Recently, there have been a couple of lead paint actions in which the plaintiff has been attempting to extend that statute of limitations even further, beyond 21 years of age. See Vasilatos v. Dzamba, 148 AD3d 1275 (2017). The Appellate Division, Third Department, has just issued another such decision.

Plaintiff commenced his action in December 2014, after turning 24 years old. He claimed he had been injured from lead paint exposure when he was a child living at the property owned by the defendants. After discovery, the defendants moved for summary judgment.

The record showed that plaintiff had been exposed to lead as a child. He had been diagnosed with an elevated blood lead level when he was three years old. Another record showed an elevated blood lead level in 1992 when he was two years old, with ongoing follow-up testing showing his blood lead level remained elevated through 1996. Plaintiff testified that he recalled removing paint chips from the walls and placing them in his mouth many times. Further, plaintiff testified about symptoms of cognitive deficits that he had since childhood.

In attempting to extend the statute of limitations beyond 21 years of age, the plaintiff claimed he did not know he had sustained injuries as a result of an elevated blood lead level until July 2013, when he received a solicitation letter from an attorney, relying on CPLR §214–c(2).

Under CPLR §214–c(2), the three-year statute of limitation begins to run, when caused by the latent effects of exposure to any substance or combination of substances, in any form, upon or within the body, or upon or within property, from the date of discovery of the injury by the plaintiff, or from the date when through the exercise of reasonable diligence such injury should have been discovered by the plaintiff, whichever is earlier.

Based upon review the evidence, the Court, in Haynes v. Williams, 218 NY Slip Op 04626 (3rd Dept. 2018), rejected the argument, and dismissed the plaintiff’s action. The Court found that there was sufficient evidence to demonstrate plaintiff was cognizant of his claimed injuries, or at a minimum, reasonably should have been, such that the action was barred by the statute of limitations. Moreover, the Court stated that plaintiff had been aware of his injuries since early childhood. This is because the statute runs from the date the condition or symptom is discovered or reasonably should have been discovered, not the discovery of the specific cause of the condition or symptom.

As stated, this is yet another lead paint action in which the plaintiff attempted to toll the statute limitations beyond the age of 21 on the grounds that he did not know about injuries he received as a result of his exposure to lead based paint. It will be interesting to see whether any set of circumstances claimed by plaintiff would be sufficient to extend the statute of limitations under CPLR §214–c(2) beyond 21.

SDG LAW