D'Almeida v. Stork-Brabant
Opinion
USCA1 Opinion
January 11, 1996 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT
____________
No. 95-1513
JOSE D'ALMEIDA,
Plaintiff,
v.
STORK BRABANT B.V. AND STORK BRABANT, INC.,
Defendants/Third Party Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
GERRITSE PROJECTEN, TEXMACH, B.V.,
AND ING. GERRITSE, B.V.,
Third Party Defendants-Appellees.
____________
ERRATA SHEET
The opinion of this court issued on December 11, 1995, is
amended as follows:
Page 7, line 2: Change "Stork" to "Gerritse."
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT
____________________
No. 95-1513
JOSE D'ALMEIDA,
Plaintiff,
v.
STORK BRABANT B.V. AND STORK BRABANT, INC.,
Defendants/Third Party Plaintiffs-Appellants.
v.
GERRITSE PROJECTEN, TEXMACH, B.V.,
AND ING. GERRITSE, B.V.,
Third Party Defendants-Appellees.
____________________
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. Reginald C. Lindsay, U.S. District Judge] ___________________
____________________
Before
Cyr, Circuit Judge, _____________
Bownes, Senior Circuit Judge, ____________________
Boudin, Circuit Judge. _____________
____________________
John J. McGivney, with whom Burns & Levinson was on brief for _________________ ________________
Stork Brabant, B.V. and Stork Brabant, Inc., defendants, third-party
plaintiffs-appellants.
John T. Montgomery, with whom Jeffrey P. Trout, and Ropes & Gray, ___________________ ________________ ____________
were on brief for Ing. Gerritse, B.V., third-party defendant-appellee.
____________________
December 11, 1995
____________________
Per Curiam. Stork Brabant B.V. and Stork Brabant, Inc. __________
("Stork") appeal from a judgment of the district court
dismissing a third-party action for indemnification and
contribution against Ing. Gerritse B.V. ("Gerritse"). The
facts are set out at length in the Report and Recommendation
of the magistrate judge; the legal issues are whether the
Massachusetts long-arm statute, Mass. Gen. L. ch. 223A,
3(d), authorizes the assertion of personal jurisdiction over
Gerritse, and, if so, whether such an assertion of
jurisdiction is consistent with due process. Although we
would normally decide the issue if possible on the basis of
the statute, in this case there is real doubt as to how the
Massachusetts courts would decide the statutory issue, and
the resolution of the constitutional issue is, by contrast,
reasonably clear. We therefore proceed to the due process
analysis.
The third-party complaint, which we accept at this
stage, reveals that Stork, as a distributor, ordered a
machine from Gerritse; after negligently and/or in breach of
warranty producing a defective machine, Gerritse sent it to
Massachusetts on Stork's instruction. Whether this course of
conduct gave Gerritse "minimum contacts" with the forum state
as to satisfy the requirements of the due process clause, see ___
International Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U.S. 310, 316 ________________________ __________
(1945), is a very close call. The arguments on both sides
-2- -2-
are ably set forth in the magistrate judge's report; while
she concluded that minimum contacts were not present, and the
district court agreed, we need not decide the issue, which
would be especially difficult if the injured plaintiff in
this case had brought suit against Gerritse.
But even if minimum contacts were arguably present, due
process further imposes a requirement that the assertion of
jurisdiction be "consistent with traditional notions of fair
play and substantial justice" International Shoe, 326 U.S. at __________________
316, and this additional requirement controls here. The sole
cause of action against Gerritse is an action by Stork for
indemnification. The parties must reasonably have expected
that any litigation between them would not take place in
Massachusetts; indeed, their contract included a forum
selection clause designating Holland as the locus of
litigation. More important, Massachusetts' interest in the
indemnification dispute are extremely limited, the
compensation of its citizen not being at stake.
Extensive discussion is unnecessary because in our view
this phase of the case is directly governed by Asahi Metal ___________
Industry Co. v. Superior Court, 480 U.S. 102, 113-16 (1987). ____________ ______________
There eight justices applied the "fair play and substantial
justice" requirement to hold that jurisdiction was lacking in
quite similar circumstances. Thus, even if minimum contacts
were barely present, a question we decline to answer, the
-3- -3-
assertion of jurisdiction over Gerritse in this
indemnification action would still be unconstitutional.
Affirmed. _________
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