does anyone know why is there a statute of limitations?

[pkdu]

2. From Wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_limitations

Purpose[edit]


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The purpose and effect of Statutes of Limitation is to protect defendants. There are three reasons that support the existence of Statutes of Limitation, namely: (a) that a plaintiff with good causes of actions should pursue them with reasonable diligence; (b) that a defendant might have lost evidence to disprove a stale claim; and (c) that long dormant claims have more of cruelty than justice in them (Halsbury's Laws of England, 4th edition). The general rule is that the limitation period begins when the plaintiff’s cause of action accrues or is made to be aware of the injury that might have happened a long time ago (e.g.asbestos injury). In Classical Athens a five-year statute of limitations was established for all cases other than homicide and for prosecutions against unconstitutional laws, which had no limitation. Demosthenes wrote that these statutes of limitations were adopted to specifically to control sycophants.[1]