On February 4, 2025, the First Department issued a decision in Lazar v. Mor, 2025 NY Slip Op. 00630, holding that amended claims related back to the original complaint even though they involved new causes of action, explaining:
The court providently exercised its discretion in granting plaintiffs’ motion for leave to file a second amended complaint asserting breach of the LLCs’ operating agreements claims.
Defendants do not dispute that the alleged breaches (i.e., the postsale distributions) that occurred after July 13, 2016 fall within the applicable limitations period. Defendants argue, however, that the claims pertaining to the distributions prior to July 13, 2016 are untimely. The argument is unavailing, as the relation-back doctrine (CPLR 203[f]) applies to those claims.
The allegations in the amended complaint put defendants on notice of the transactions and occurrences that were the subject of plaintiffs’ proposed second amended complaint — that is, defendants’ capital contributions and distributions. Defendants’ argument that the relation-back doctrine does not apply because the original and amended complaints did not contain a cause of action for breach of the operating agreements is unavailing. As Supreme Court found, CPLR 203(f) focuses on transactions and occurrences in the prior pleadings; it does not require an identity of the causes of action alleged.
Defendants’ related argument, that the prior order deciding their motion to dismiss is law of the case as to the statute of limitations, is also meritless. Indeed, the purpose of the relation-back doctrine is to enable a plaintiff to correct a pleading error — by adding either a new claim or a new party — after the statutory limitations period has expired.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).