On January 28, 2025, Maine’s highest appellate court issued its decision in Dupuis v. Roman Catholic Bishop of Portland (https://www.courts.maine.gov/courts/sjc/lawcourt/2025/25me006.pdf), a case in which Jerry Petruccelli was lead counsel for the Bishop, with the assistance of Scott Dolan, Jim Haddow, and Mike Martin.
The Dupuis case is a landmark decision rooted deeply in the Maine State Constitution. In it, the Law Court holds that the Maine Legislature does not have the authority to revive legal claims after the statute of limitations has expired. In the words of the majority opinion, “Once a statute of limitations has expired for a claim, a right to be free of that claim has vested, and the claim cannot be revived.”
The decision resolved a dispute over the enforceability of a 2021 amendment to state law that eliminated the statute of limitations on civil cases based on claims of child sex abuse retroactively, thus reviving claims that had previously been barred by expiration of the statute of limitations in effect before the unconstitutional attempt to repeal it.