June 29, 2020 June 29, 2020 Supreme Court No. 2018-198-Appeal. No. 2018-199-Appeal. No. 2018-200-Appeal. No. 2018-201-Appeal. No. 2018-202-Appeal. No. 2018-203-Appeal. No. 2018-204-Appeal. (PC 12-1844) Dionisio Polanco et al. : v. : James J. Lombardi, III, in his capacity as : Treasurer of the City of Providence, et al. NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the Rhode Island Reporter. Readers are requested to notify the Opinion Analyst, Supreme Court of Rhode Island, 250 Benefit Street, Providence, Rhode Island 02903, at Telephone (401) 222-3258 or Email opinionanalyst@courts.ri.gov, of any typographical or other formal errors in order that corrections may be made before the opinion is published. Supreme Court No. 2018-198-Appeal. No. 2018-199-Appeal. No. 2018-200-Appeal. No. 2018-201-Appeal. No. 2018-202-Appeal. No. 2018-203-Appeal. No. 2018-204-Appeal. (PC 12-1844) (Dissent begins on Page 27) Dionisio Polanco et al. : v. : James J. Lombardi, III, in his capacity as : Treasurer of the City of Providence, et al. Present: Suttell, C.J., Goldberg, Flaherty, Robinson, and Indeglia, JJ. OPINION Justice Robinson, for the Court. The plaintiffs, Dionisio Polanco and his wife Alexandra Lozada-Polanco, individually and on behalf of their five minor children, appeal from an April 10, 2018 final judgment of the Providence County Superior Court for the defendants, James J. Lombardi, III, in his capacity as Treasurer of the City of Providence, and Officer Michael Camardo, on all counts in the plaintiffs’ complaint. The final judgment followed a February 28, 2018 bench decision and an April 10, 2018 order of the Superior Court granting the defendants’ motion for summary judgment on the ground that the statute of limitations had run before the plaintiffs filed their complaint in the instant case. On appeal, the plaintiffs make the following contentions with respect to the running of the statute of limitations in this case: (1) the discovery rule should be applied when, as the plaintiffs purport occurred in the instant case, “an innocent plaintiff is convicted of a crime because of a police officer’s egregiously negligent failure to record -1- or report exculpatory evidence, and the plaintiff did not know, and could not have known, the existence of that exculpatory evidence;” (2) “[f]rom when Mr. Polanco was convicted through when his conviction was vacated, the Exoneration Rule prevented Plaintiffs-Appellants from bringing this claim, and the statute of limitations on negligence claims arising from his conviction were tolled;” (3) “[b]ecause Officer Camardo made actual misrepresentations that concealed his egregious negligence, G.L. 1956 § 9-1-20 delayed accrual of this claim;” and (4) the statute of limitations should be equitably tolled given the particular facts of this case. For the reasons set forth in this opinion, we affirm the judgment of the Superior Court. I Facts and Travel Fortunately, the facts and travel of this case are largely not in dispute; and we shall proceed at once to relate the circumstances forming the basis of this action. In so doing, we rely primarily on the first amended complaint, defendants’ memorandum accompanying their motion for summary judgment in Superior ...
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