Rogers v. Cape May County Office of the Public Defender, 208 N.J. 414 (2011). Rogers sought to sue his public defender attorney for legal malpractice after Rogers’s application for post-conviction relief was granted and the indictment against him was thereafter dismissed with prejudice. The key question in the case was whether the one-year statute of limitations of N.J.S.A. 59:8-9, which is triggered by “exoneration,” under McKnight v. Office of the Public Defender, 197 N.J. 180 (2008), ran from the date that the post-conviction relief was granted or from the date that the indictment was dismissed with prejudice. Writing for a unanimous Court, Justice Long held that the trigger date was the date that the indictment was dismissed.
Relying on McKnight, Justice Long reached what seems to be a common sense conclusion. The reversal of a criminal conviction, by virtue of post-conviction relief or otherwise, “is not ‘exoneration.’ Indeed, that ‘benefit’ of reversal is ephemeral and may be short-lived if defendant is retried and reconvicted. In those circumstances, defendant will not have been damaged by [the public defender’s] inadequacy. It is the outcome of the new trial or plea that will be determinative on the issue of whether injury has been sustained.”
But there was another issue. Rogers had filed the required notice of tort claim ten days beyond the normal 90-day period set forth in the Tort Claims Act for such pre-suit notices. The lower courts did not reach the issue of whether Rogers had satisfied the conditions of N.J.S.A. 59:8-9 that would allow filing of a notice of tort claim up to one year after accrual of his claim. The Court remanded the case for further consideration of that issue. Sections III and VI of Justice Long’s opinion contain a useful summary of some fundamental Tort Claims Act principles implicated in the case.