Medical Malpractice Attorneys Successfully End Litigation Against Hospital And Nurse Sued For False Imprisonment

Grund · Dagner’s medical malpractice and hospital defense attorneys won a Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings ending litigation against a nurse and a hospital alleged to have falsely imprisoned a patient during an emergency-room visit in 2009.

The ruling held that when alleged false imprisonment occurs at a Colorado hospital, the more specific one-year statute of limitations, which applies to false imprisonment claims under § 13-80-103(1), C.R.S., controls over the more general two-year statute of limitations for claims against healthcare institutions, found in § 13-80-102.5, C.R.S.  In Colorado, assault, battery, false-arrest, libel, slander and false-imprisonment claims are all subject to a statute of limitations of one year after the cause of action accrues. This health-care liability defense case was filed in Arapahoe County District Court, and the plaintiff did not appeal the ruling.