How To Prove A California Statute of Limitations (Breach of Contract) Defense

 

 

In California, a defense of Statute of Limitations (Breach of Contract) is defined as:

A statute of limitations is a law that sets the maximum time a party has to initiate legal proceedings from the date of an alleged event.

It simply means:

Some legal actions can only be brought within a certain time frame.

There are 2 elements of the defense:

• Element 1. Claimed harm giving rise to lawsuit occurred more than two years before filing suit for oral contract or more than four years before filing for written contract. If someone wants to sue for a broken contract, they must do so within two years for an oral agreement or four years for a written one; if they wait longer than that, their case may be dismissed because too much time has passed.
  

  Facts that might support this element look like:

  * The alleged breach of the oral contract occurred in January 2020, while the lawsuit was filed in March 2023.
  * The written contract was signed in February 2019, and the plaintiff did not file suit until April 2023.
  * The plaintiff acknowledged the breach in a communication dated December 2020, well over two years before the lawsuit was initiated.
  * The last performance under the written contract took place in March 2019, with no further actions taken until the lawsuit was filed in May 2023.
  * The plaintiff’s claim of harm was first articulated in a letter sent in July 2021, which is more than two years prior to the lawsuit’s filing date.

• Element 2. No tolling provisions apply. Tolling refers to circumstances that pause or extend the statute of limitations period. No tolling provisions mean that the time limit for filing a lawsuit due to a breach of contract cannot be paused or extended, so the clock keeps ticking regardless of any circumstances that might otherwise delay the legal process.
  

  Facts that might support this element look like:

  * The plaintiff was aware of the breach of contract on the date it occurred, which negates any need for tolling.
  * The defendant did not engage in any conduct that would have prevented the plaintiff from filing a claim within the statutory period.
  * The plaintiff did not request any extensions or indicate any reasons for delay in pursuing the claim.
  * There were no extraordinary circumstances that would justify pausing the statute of limitations in this case.
  * The contract explicitly stated the time frame for bringing claims, and the plaintiff failed to act within that period.

^{(See California Civil Jury Instructions (CACI), No. 338. Romano v. Rockwell Internat., Inc., 14 Cal. 4th 479 – Cal: Supreme Court 1996.)}
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Prove Your CA Statute of Limitations (Breach of Contract) Defense

U.S. Civil Cases Only