HENRY BELL
v.
CITY OF JACKSONVILLE AND JACKSONVILLE TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY

Fla. 1st DCA | 2019-08-23
No. 18-2615
Roberson, J., Rowe, J., Jay, J., M.K. Thomas, J.
Florida District Court of Appeal, First District (2019) Positive Treatment

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

The court affirmed dismissal of a negligence claim against the Jacksonville Transportation Authority on statute of limitations grounds, finding the claim did not relate back to the original complaint against the City of Jacksonville, and dismissed as untimely the appeal of a partial summary judgment order in favor of the City.


Holding

A negligence claim asserted for the first time against the Jacksonville Transportation Authority in an amended complaint was untimely and did not relate back to claims against the City of Jacksonville, a separate legal entity.


Headnotes

[1] When a claim is asserted for the first time against a newly named defendant in an amended complaint, the relation-back doctrine does not apply where the newly named defen…

Previewing 1 of 1 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Facts & Procedural History

Henry Bell filed a negligence claim against the City of Jacksonville and later amended his complaint to add the Jacksonville Transportation Authority …

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court

PER CURIAM.

Henry Bell appeals an order dismissing his negligence claim against the Jacksonville Transit Authority. We find no error in the trial court’s dismissal of the claim on statute of limitations grounds. The claim, asserted for the first time against the JTA in the amended complaint, was untimely and did not relate back to the claims asserted in the original complaint against the City of Jacksonville, a separate and distinct legal entity. See Patel v. Sch. Bd. of Volusia Cty., 813 So. 2d 135, 136 (Fla. 5th DCA 2002) (finding that the county and the county school board were not sufficiently related to justify application of the relation-back doctrine). Bell also appeals a separate order granting partial summary judgment to the City of Jacksonville. See Fla. R. App. P. 9.110(k) (providing that partial final judgments are reviewable either on appeal from the partial final judgment or on appeal from the final judgment in the entire case); Roessler v. Novak, 858 So. 2d 1158, 1160 n.1 (Fla. 2d DCA 2003). This portion of the appeal is dismissed as untimely. See, e.g., Wagner v. Wells Fargo Bank, N. A., 249 So. 3d 620 (Fla. 2d DCA 2018) (“Timely filing of the notice of appeal is jurisdictional.”).

AFFIRMED in part and DISMISSED in part.

ROWE, JAY, and M.K. THOMAS, JJ., concur.

_____________________________

Not final until disposition of any timely and authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or 9.331. _____________________________

Michael D. McGrath and M. Brad Gibson of McGrath Gibson, LLC, Jacksonville, for Appellant.

Katy A. Harris, Office of General Counsel, City of Jacksonville, for City of Jacksonville; Beverly A. Pohl of Nelson Mullins Broad and Cassel, Fort Lauderdale, and Richard N. Milian of Nelson Mullins Broad and Cassel, Orlando, for Jacksonville Transportation Authority, Appellees.

2


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw