ST. LOUIS — The Missouri Court of Appeals for the Eastern District has upheld a lower court’s dismissal of a lawsuit filed by a woman against a St. Louis police officer and St. Louis, ruling that her claims were barred by a three-year statute of limitations.
Deborah Bailey had filed suit in March 2023, alleging that Officer Brendan Byers negligently rear-ended her vehicle on March 27, 2019, while he was operating a patrol car in the city of St. Louis.
Bailey also sought to hold the city liable under the legal doctrine of respondeat superior, which allows employers to be held accountable for the actions of their employees.
The circuit court dismissed Bailey’s claims against both defendants, finding that they were filed outside the applicable time limit.
Bailey appealed, arguing that Missouri’s five-year statute of limitations under section 516.120 should apply.
The appellate court disagreed, affirming the lower court’s finding that the three-year statute of limitations found in section 516.130 governed the claims against both Byers and the city.
In its opinion, the appellate court held that Byers qualified as an “officer” under the statute, which provides a shorter three-year limitations period for claims brought against public officials.
The court determined that at the time of the accident, Byers was acting in his official capacity as a police officer and carrying out duties assigned by the city.
The court emphasized that the term “other officer” in section 516.130 has historically been interpreted to include individuals like police officers who exercise sovereign functions of government.
Citing precedent from Dilley v. Valentine, the court reaffirmed that negligence claims against police officers operating within the scope of their official duties fall under the three-year limitation.
The court also rejected Bailey’s argument that Byers’s conduct did not arise under the authority of his position.
The court pointed to Bailey’s petition, which described Byers as acting within the scope of his employment and performing a job assigned by the city at the time of the crash.
This admission, the court concluded, was fatal to her claim that a longer statute should apply.
Turning to the city of St. Louis, the appellate court also upheld the dismissal of Bailey’s vicarious liability claim.
Though section 516.130(1) does not explicitly list governmental entities, the court found that prior decisions from the Missouri Supreme Court—particularly Investors Title Co. v. Hammonds—permit governmental entities to be considered “officers” under the statute when the claim is based solely on an employee’s actions performed in an official capacity.
Because Bailey’s claim against the city was based entirely on Byers’s conduct and did not include any independent allegations of negligence against the city itself, the three-year statute of limitations applied.
The court further cited Cox v. Ripley County, noting that the three-year period under section 516.130 is particularly appropriate when a lawsuit involves a single public official whose official conduct is at issue, as was the case here.
In affirming the circuit court’s judgment, the appellate court concluded that both Byers and the city were properly granted dismissal because Bailey’s lawsuit was time-barred. Judges Lisa P. Page and Rebeca Navarro-McKelvey concurred with Judge Virginia Lay’s opinion.
Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District case number: ED112520