Kleve v. Negangard (330 F.2d 74, 1964)

PER CURIAM.

This case involves a question of what statute of limitations applied to plaintiff-appellant’s asserted cause of action, Plaintiff-appellant, Karl Kleve, was, from june 18 to June 21, 1955, imprisoned in the county jail of Dearborn County, Indiana. Defendant-appellee, Ernest F. Negangard, was that county’s sheriff and, we assume, its jailer. Defendantappellee, Fidelity and Deposit Company of Maryland, was surety on Negangard’s pub]ic official bond, Arrested by Indiana state Troopers, plaintiff was delivered into tbe eustody of defendant sheriff. No charge was made, and he was released at the end of the above-mentioned „ . , . „ , . _ period. An answer of defendant sheriff , gave an explanation for the arrest and . . . „ . „ imprisonment of plaintiff, but for our de- . . ... , cisión it is assumed that the sheriff s conduct amounted to false imprisonment. in®tant suit was started on June 17, ^our^ Common Pleas of Hamilton County, Ohio, service was had in Chio on the defendants, and the cause was ^en removed to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio.

Defendants, in separate answers, pleaded the one-year Ohio statute of limitations applicable to actions for false imprisonment, Page’s Ohio Revised Code, § 2305.11, and a two-year Indiana statute of limitations applicable to actions for “injuries to person or character,” Burns’ Indiana Statutes, Anno., § 2-602. Indiana had no limitations statute specifically applying to false imprisonment. The District Court granted defendants’ motions for judgment on the pleadings, holding that plaintiff’s action was barred , , ,, T , , , , under both the Indiana two-year statute and the Ohio one-year statute.

Plaintiff sougbt e from the forcgoing br asserting that his cause of action was not exclusively one for false imprisonment, but was also for damage to his character and good reputation, for loss of business and profit, for mental anguish, disgrace and physical suffering, and for violation of his constitutional rights. These charges, in our view, are merely descriptive of the damages that resulted from the tort of false imprisonment. Plaintiff also insists that the only statute of limitations applicable here was an Indiana five-year statute, applicable to “all actions against a sheriff * * * and his sureties on a public bond, growing out of a liability incurred by doing an act in an official capacity * * Burns’ Indiana Statutes, Anno., § 2-602. If such statute was the only applicable one, the action was timely by one day. We are satisfied, however, that the District Judge cor.rectly ruled that the action was barred by the Ohio one-year limitation on actions for false imprisonment. Such was ithe only tort described by plaintiff’s complaint.

This was a diversity case. Subject to constitutional limitations, the conflict of laws rule of the forum state controls as to whether questions involving limitations of actions are procedural