Duran

Benjamin Franklin described the snowballing consequences of inattention to a small detail—“For want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the rider was lost.” (Oxford Dict. of Quotations (2d ed. 1955) p. 211.) In this case the missing nail is a check that was $3 short of the amount required to file a complaint for medical malpractice that allegedly caused the death of the plaintiffs’ infant child. The harsh but unavoidable result is that we affirm the trial court’s dismissal of the complaint because it was not filed before the statute of limitations ran.

There is no dispute as to what happened in 2002. The parties agree that the final day for filing the complaint was October 9. On October 7 plaintiffs’ San Diego attorney sent the complaint and summons by Federal Express to the filing clerk of the San Francisco Superior Court. Also sent was a check for $203. On October 8 the clerk received the complaint but did not file it because the filing fee was $206, $3 more than the amount of the check. By the time plaintiffs’ attorney learned of the situation and tendered the correct filing fee, the statute of limitations had…