Riccio v. Bristol Hospital, Inc.

Summary

The court affirmed dismissal of the plaintiff’s second medical malpractice action as time barred because the attorney’s failure to include the opinion authors’ qualifications in the first action was not shown to be mistake, inadvertence, or excusable neglect under the accidental failure of suit statute. The attorney had practiced medical malpractice law for years, had failed to review controlling precedent issued years earlier, and offered no explanation demonstrating diligent but unsuccessful research. The court emphasized that the inquiry is fact intensive and that ignorance of the law is not automatically either excusable neglect or gross negligence.