The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by T & S Taverns Limited over whether a personal injuries claim arising from an incident at the Red Cow Inn was barred by the Statute of Limitations. It held that the proceedings were brought within the extended time limit created by the Personal Injuries Assessment Board process.
Robert Renehan claims he was injured on 14 July 2007 while working as a security officer at the Red Cow Inn complex on the Naas Road in Dublin. He says a car drove through bollards, mounted the footpath and struck him outside the nightclub Club Diva. The driver was later identified as Christopher Dunne. Renehan’s claim against the company alleges negligence in the management and organisation of the nightclub, including an allegation that a similar incident had occurred shortly before and adequate preventative steps were not taken. The Supreme Court did not decide the merits of those allegations.
Renehan’s solicitors initially applied to PIAB naming Thomas Moran trading as Club Diva. After the Board issued an authorisation in October 2009, the company’s loss adjusters told the solicitors in December that T & S Taverns owned the Red Cow Inn and could be named in proceedings. The solicitors asked PIAB to amend the authorisation, explaining that the company had been omitted through ignorance of the facts. PIAB issued a second authorisation naming T & S Taverns on 3 February 2010. Renehan began proceedings against the company on 18 May 2010.
The company argued that the claim was already out of time when it was first identified as a potential defendant, because the two-year period from the incident had passed. The High Court rejected that argument in 2011, ruling that the claim was not statute barred. The company appealed.
In a judgment delivered by Justice O’Donnell, the Supreme Court treated the second authorisation as one issued under section 46(3) of the PIAB Act 2003. That provision allows an authorisation where a claimant omitted a potential defendant through genuine oversight or ignorance of the facts. The Court said the relevant limitation pause began with the original PIAB application and ended six months after the second authorisation. On that calculation, the limitation period expired around 17 August 2010, so the May proceedings were in time.
The Court dismissed the appeal. It did not need to decide the other arguments raised about the discoverability of the company’s identity, alleged concealment, or whether the company was prevented by its conduct from relying on the limitation period. The personal injuries claim itself remains undecided in this appeal.