CIT Should Toss 20-Year-Old AD Duty Collection, Surety Company Argues
The Court of International Trade should deny a government motion to amend a complaint and toss the action with respect to a single entry, American Home Assurance Company (AHAC) said in an Aug. 14 motion. DOJ is seeking antidumping duties and interest on eight single transaction bonds issued over 20 years ago (U.S. v. American Home Assurance Co., CIT # 20-00175).
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The case originally concerned canned mushrooms imported from China between 2000 and 2001. The government, which is looking to collect antidumping duties plus statutory interest and post-judgment interest, is "not only attempting to circumvent the applicable six-year statute of limitations," AHAC said, "but toll the statute of limitations by nearly ten years as calculated by the date of the Government’s demand on AHAC." Nearly three years after the complaint was filed, "the Government is again effectively asking this Court to further toll the statute of limitations by allowing for the modification of a bond and its relation back to the original pleading," the company said.
DOJ's motion should be construed as a request for CIT to grant an extension of time to amend its pleading despite the time period for amended filings having long expired, AHAC said. "The Government cannot demonstrate excusable neglect or circumstances beyond the control of the Government in order to justify its motion to amend the pleadings," AHAC said. It has had "nearly twenty-three years to identify the defect underlying the subject STB" and has had more than enough time to address the bond defect under authority of the customs regulations, AHAC said.
DOJ has argued that sureties have a unique liability to pay the unpaid duties. To establish that the statute of limitations hasn't run out on collecting payments on a decade-plus-old bill, the government has argued that its issuance of a bill to the surety constitutes a reliquidation of the entries, allowing it to collect duties from the sureties at a much later date than the date of liquidation (see 2105170036).
AHAC has previously called the matter a "straight-forward statute of limitations case" (see 2210280026) that the government is attempting to delay and distract from.