The opinion filed February 18, 2014, and appearing at 2014 WL 612503, is amended. The amended opinion will be filed concurrently with this order.
The petition for rehearing is
GARBIS, Senior District Judge:
On April 13, 2006, USA Commercial Mortgage Company ("USACM") filed for bankruptcy in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Nevada. USACM's confirmed Chapter 11 plan created a bankruptcy litigation trust, USACM Liquidating Trust (the "Trust"), for purposes of pursuing USACM's claims for the benefit of holders of allowed unsecured claims in USACM's bankruptcy. On April 11, 2008, the Trust sued USACM's former outside auditor, Deloitte & Touche LLP, alleging that Deloitte wrongfully issued unqualified audit opinions for fiscal years 2000 and 2001, concealing the misappropriations of USACM's funds through two allegedly fraudulent schemes perpetrated by Thomas Hantges and Joseph Milanowski (the owners and controllers of USACM). The charged misappropriations caused USACM to sustain millions of dollars in losses and required its bankruptcy filing.
The Trust appeals from the district court's summary judgment in favor of Deloitte. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.
The district court properly granted summary judgment to Deloitte on the ground that the misconduct of Hantges and Milanowski must be imputed to USACM under Nevada's "sole actor" rule.
Because the district court properly imputed Hantges' and Milanowski's misconduct to USACM, the district court also properly granted summary judgment to Deloitte on its affirmative defense that USACM's claims had expired under Nevada law prior to April 13, 2006, the petition date, and were thus ineligible for the two-year extension of applicable limitations periods under 11 U.S.C. § 108(a) that would have rendered its claims (filed on April 11, 2008) timely.
With regard to the aiding and abetting breaches of fiduciary duty claim, USACM would have discovered Deloitte's failure to report and/or affirmative cover-up of Hantges' and Milanowski's fraudulent schemes no later than when Deloitte terminated its services with USACM in January 2003. Thus, the three-year limitations period provided by Nev.Rev.Stat. Ann. § 11.190(3)(d)
The district court correctly decided that there should be no concealment-based tolling of limitations because Deloitte could not have concealed from USACM that which USACM knew based upon the imputation of Hantges' and Milanowski's knowledge to USACM.
The district court also properly declined to apply the adverse domination doctrine, which tolls claims alleging wrongdoing by those who control the corporation under certain circumstances. See Fed. Deposit Ins. Corp. v. Jackson, 133 F.3d 694, 698 (9th Cir.1998). Nevada has not adopted the doctrine, and we conclude that Nevada would not do so. The doctrine tolls the accrual of a cause of action based on the premise that a corporation does not have knowledge of a claim until the wrongdoing directors are no longer in control. Cf. Indep. Trust Corp. v. Stewart Info. Servs. Corp., 665 F.3d 930, 935 (7th Cir.2012) ("Because a plaintiff-corporation can learn that it has been injured only through the knowledge of its agents, if the agents' interests are adverse to the corporation, the agents' knowledge is not imputed to the corporation."). This premise is inconsistent with Nevada's sole actor rule, under which the wrongdoing agents' knowledge is imputed to the corporation. Because Hantges' and Milanowski's knowledge is imputed to USACM here, the adverse domination doctrine cannot be applied to toll the statute of limitations.
Because the Trust's claims are barred by the applicable statute of limitations under Nevada law, we do not reach, and do not address other issues presented by the parties, including those related to Deloitte's alternative in pari delicto defense.