Where a plaintiff originally named the wrong defendant in a car accident case and did not file an amended complaint naming the correct defendant until after the one-year statute of limitations had run, dismissal was affirmed. In Black v. Khel, No. W2020-00228-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Dec. 30, 2020), plaintiff and defendant were involved in a car accident on May 11, 2018. In March 2019, plaintiff was involved in a separate car accident with a driver named Taylor Antonsen. On May 8, 2019, plaintiff filed a complaint for personal injury damages from the first accident, but she failed to name defendant as a party or refer to defendant in any way. Instead, plaintiff named “Taylor Antonsen” as the opposing party and referred to Antonsen throughout the complaint. One week after filing the complaint, On May 15, 2019, plaintiff realized the mistake and filed an amended complaint naming defendant as the other driver in the accident.
Defendant received a summons for the amended complaint then filed a motion to dismiss, asserting that plaintiff’s case was barred by the one-year statute of limitations. Plaintiff argued that her amended complaint related back to the filing of her original complaint under Rule 15.03, but the trial court rejected that argument and granted defendant’s motion to dismiss. The Court of Appeals affirmed dismissal.