When a government wetlands restoration project allegedly results in a nuisance or a trespass, does the Statute of Limitations run from the time of the construction of the project, or the time of the actual knowledge of the nuisance? Lhotka v. United States, 114 F.3d 751 (8th Cir. 1997) In 1964, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service purchased a perpetual easement from the Lhotkas. The easement allowed the USFWS the right to entry and to maintain the wetlands in the status in which they existed in 1964, while the Lhotkas were allowed to continue farming their land when it is dry due to natural causes. In October of 1992, after the Lhotkas failed to comply with a 1990 district court order requiring them to restore the wetlands to their 1964 status, the USFWS entered the land and constructed a series of six inch dikes on the farm designed to maintain the wetlands at 1964 levels. The Lhotkas brought a Federal Tort Claims Act action against the USFWS on September 30, 1995, alleging state claims of nuisance and trespass. The District Court, Judge Rosenbaum presiding, dismissed the claims, holding that more than two years had passed since the construction of the dikes, so that the claims were time-barred. The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the case. In its decision, the court held that the appropriate time for the two year statute of limitations to begin was the point at which the Lhotkas had actual knowledge of the alleged injury to their property. The Court of Appeals found that the Lhotkas could not have had such knowledge until the rainy season, in the summer of 1993. The Court of Appeals remanded the case to the trial court, with directions to determine whether the statute of limitations ran in the time between the LhotkasÍ actual knowledge and the filing of their suit.
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