Jurisdiction (Personal)

• Author: International Law Group

Plaintiffs, farmers from the Tenasserim region of Burma, brought a class action suit against the following defendants: Unocal Corporation, individuals John Imle and Roger C. Beach (President and CEO of Unocal) and Total S.A., a French corporation. Plaintiffs alleged that the defendants were joint venturers along with Myanmar Oil and gas Enterprise (MOGE), a state owned enterprise allegedly controlled by the Burmese military Junta State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). According to plaintiffs the defendants were building offshore drilling stations and seeking to transport natural gas through the Yadana gas pipeline and into Thailand.

In order to do this, plaintiffs alleged that the defendants engaged in force and intimidation to relocate entire villages in addition to forcing local farmers to work on the pipeline and pipeline related infrastructure. They also claimed the commission of crimes against humanity, torture, violence against women, arbitrary arrest and detention, cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, and an analogous list of intentional torts.

Plaintiffs sought declaratory and injunctive relief based on the above-mentioned human rights violations. The district court dismissed Total, S.A. from the case for lack of personal jurisdiction and plaintiffs took an appeal.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirms. The Court first points out that it is the Plaintiff's burden to establish the Court's jurisdiction over a case. The Court noted that "...the district Court must first determine that a 'rule or statute potentially confers jurisdiction over the defendant and then conclude that asserting jurisdiction does not offend the principles of Fifth Amendment due process."

The Court noted that there was no basis for jurisdiction over defendant Total S.A., a French company. The Court acknowledged that the case presented interesting questions regarding whether the Court must apply the forum state's long-arm statute as well as alter ego and agency doctrines in order to impute the contacts of subsidiaries to a foreign company.

According to California's Long-Arm statute, a plaintiff can satisfy Constitutional due process requirements when it shows that a corporation has minimum contacts with the state forum and when litigation of a suit against the corporation would not offend traditional concepts of fair play and substantial justice. The law...