Reversal of $54.6 million verdict against Salvadoran generals [11th Circuit] News
Reversal of $54.6 million verdict against Salvadoran generals [11th Circuit]

Arce, et al. v. Garcia, et al., United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, Circuit Judge Tjoflat, February 28, 2005 [ruling reversing a $54.6 million verdict against two retired Salvadoran generals for allegedly allowing torture and other abuses during a 12-year civil war in El Salvador]. Excerpt:

From a United States perspective, there are many countries that oppress their citizens today, and many countries that have oppressed their citizens in decades and centuries past. A lenient approach toward equitable tolling would mean that United States courts would hear claims dating back decades, if not centuries. In enacting a statute of limitations for the TVPA, Congress surely did not intend to permit such trial-by-excavation, at least not absent extraordinary circumstances. Courts would wind up with cases that are based not on witnesses with personal knowledge, but instead on the generalized testimony of human-rights workers, diplomats, and assorted experts. Much of the evidence would pertain not to the particular incidents at issue, but to the illegitimacy of an overall regime. Nevertheless, the plaintiffs' failure in this case to qualify for equitable tolling is not a death knell for future claimants. Instead, it is merely a recognition that "extraordinary circumstances" is reserved for extraordinary facts, and not for a plaintiff's failure to timely assert her rights.

For these reasons, we conclude that the plaintiffs failed to satisfy the requirements for equitable tolling, that their claims were time-barred, and that the jury verdict should be vacated and the plaintiffs' claims dismissed.

Read the full text of the opinion here [PDF]. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.