Connex Credit Union v. Madgic

Syllabus

The plaintiff credit union sought to recover damages from the defendants for a deficiency balance stemming from their default on a retail installment contract and security agreement for the purchase of a motor vehicle, which the plaintiff had repossessed and sold following the defendants' default. The defendants also sought to recover damages from the plaintiff in a two count counterclaim under article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) (§ 42a- 9-675) and the Retail Installment Sales Financing Act (RISFA) (§ 36a-785), alleging, inter alia, that the plaintiff had failed to provide the defendants with adequate notice under those statutes before and after repossession and sale. The trial court granted the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment on the defendants' counterclaim, concluding that §§ 42a-9-625 and 36a-785 are penal statutes subject to the one year limitation period set forth in the statute of limitations (§ 52-585) governing actions \for any forfeiture upon any penal statute\ and that the defendants' claims under §§ 42a-9-625 and 36a-785 were therefore time barred because they had accrued more than one year before the defendants filed their counterclaim. The trial court also denied the defendants' motion for class certification with respect to their counterclaim on the same ground. On appeal from the granting of the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment, the defendants claimed that the trial court had improperly applied the one year limitation period in § 52-585 to their counterclaim and, instead, should have applied either the four year limitation period set forth in article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code (§ 42a-2-725) governing breach of sales contracts or the three year statutory (§ 52-577) limitation period governing tort actions. Held: The trial court having improperly applied the one year limitation period in § 52-585 to the defendants' counterclaim under both article 9 of the UCC and RISFA, that court also improperly granted the plaintiff's m