McDonnell v. Roy E. Beatty & Associates, Inc.

418 S.E.2d 95, 203 Ga. App. 807, 92 Fulton County D. Rep. 110, 1992 Ga. App. LEXIS 643
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedMarch 20, 1992
DocketA91A2131
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 418 S.E.2d 95 (McDonnell v. Roy E. Beatty & Associates, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
McDonnell v. Roy E. Beatty & Associates, Inc., 418 S.E.2d 95, 203 Ga. App. 807, 92 Fulton County D. Rep. 110, 1992 Ga. App. LEXIS 643 (Ga. Ct. App. 1992).

Opinions

Pope, Judge.

Plaintiffs Marjette Lacey McDonnell and Mitchell Todd Lacey are the surviving children of the late Dr. J. Allen Lacey and Meredith D. Lacey. Dr. and Mrs. Lacey were killed when an airplane piloted by Dr. Lacey crashed soon after takeoff from Peachtree-DeKalb Airport in DeKalb County on October 1, 1989. Plaintiffs filed suit against defendant Roy E. Beatty & Associates, Inc., alleging that the crash occurred as a result of instrument failure due to defendant’s faulty maintenance of the plane. Defendant moved to dismiss the complaint on the ground that it was not subject to personal jurisdiction in Georgia. The trial court granted defendant’s motion to dismiss and denied plaintiffs’ motion for leave to conduct additional discovery. Plaintiffs appeal.

The record shows defendant is a Florida corporation. Defendant owned the plane and leased it to Lacey-Champion Carpets of Florida, Inc., another Florida corporation, of which Dr. and Mrs. Lacey were officers and shareholders. The plane was used primarily by the Laceys for personal trips. Pursuant to the terms of the lease, defendant had the duty to provide service and maintenance for the plane. Defendant presented evidence that its only place of business is in Florida; that it [808]*808never operated in Georgia and never bought a plane from or sold a plane to anyone in Georgia; that it never conducted or solicited business in Georgia or engaged in any persistent course of conduct in Georgia; that it never derived substantial revenue from goods used or services rendered in Georgia; and that it never engaged in consulting work or airplane management services in Georgia. The trial court found defendant’s sole contact with Georgia was an isolated appraisal of an aircraft performed almost one year after the crash, and that this activity was neither substantial nor sufficiently related causally to the plaintiffs’ claim to trigger personal jurisdiction.

Plaintiffs, however, argue that defendant benefitted from their parents’ use of Georgia airport facilities. Plaintiffs point out that Mr. Roy E. Beatty, sole shareholder and president of the defendant corporation, was a close personal friend of their father. They argue that because Mr. Beatty was allowed to fly the plane frequently for his own use, because he accompanied Dr. Lacey on several pleasure trips to Georgia and because he knew when the defendant leased the plane that the Laceys would use the plane in Georgia then jurisdiction may be exercised over the defendant corporation because Georgia is a convenient forum in which to litigate the matter.

1. We affirm the trial court’s dismissal of the complaint for lack of personal jurisdiction. The defendant in this case is a Florida corporation which merely leased an airplane to another Florida corporation. The lessee of the plane flew it to Georgia where it crashed. It is undisputed that defendant lessor conducted no business and engaged in no activity in Georgia except for an unrelated act after the crash occurred. We cannot justify the imposition of jurisdiction over the nonresident defendant because of the unilateral acts of the lessee, over which the defendant had no control.

A nonresident defendant may be held liable for a tortious injury which occurred in this state only under two circumstances: either because the injury was due to a tortious act committed by the defendant within the state (OCGA § 9-10-91 (2)) or because the injury was caused by an act or omission of the defendant outside the state and defendant “regularly does or solicits business, or engages in any other persistent course of conduct, or derives substantial revenue from goods used or consumed or services rendered in this state . . . .” OCGA § 9-10-91 (3).

The Georgia Long-Arm Statute is different from the corresponding statute in some other states because it “requires that an out-of-state defendant must do certain acts within the State of Georgia before [it] can be subjected to personal jurisdiction.” Gust v. Flint, 257 Ga. 129, 130 (356 SE2d 513) (1987). In Georgia, a due process analysis is appropriate only after it is first established that the nonresident defendant committed one of the acts described in the Long-[809]*809Arm Statute. Thus, the due process analysis advocated by the dissenting judges is inappropriate because the record shows the defendant in this case did not commit any act which would subject it to jurisdiction in Georgia.

In opposing the motion to dismiss, plaintiffs relied on the fact that the owner and president of the defendant corporation accompanied the owner and president of the lessee of the airplane on several pleasure trips to Georgia. Plaintiffs argue these trips somehow show that the defendant corporation engaged in activity in Georgia. These trips, however, were purely personal and arose out of the friendship between Mr. Beatty and Dr. Lacey. They in no way established a course of conduct by the defendant corporation and in no way resulted in substantial revenue to the defendant corporation. Moreover, even when Mr. Beatty accompanied Dr. Lacey on personal trips to Georgia, it was the lessee (by and through Dr. Lacey) and not the defendant corporation which controlled the plane. The dissenting opinion jumps to the conclusion that Mr. Beatty was the “alter ego” of the defendant corporation. Even if he was, it cannot be said that Mr. Beatty was acting as the alter ego of the corporation on these personal trips. Mr. Beatty’s personal hunting trips to Georgia or his acts of friendship in accompanying Dr. Lacey to visit family members in Georgia in no way benefitted the corporation. Moreover, the alleged negligent act of the corporation was the improper maintenance of the airplane. The plaintiffs do not contend Mr. Beatty personally serviced the airplane. Instead, the plane was serviced by qualified aviation mechanics in the employ of the corporation. It is not Mr. Beatty, individually, who is sued, but the corporation. And the facts do not support the exercise of jurisdiction over the corporation.

The defendant’s knowledge that the lessee planned to use the plane in Georgia provides no basis on which to attribute the lessee’s acts to the defendant. All of the acts which occurred in Georgia were merely the unilateral acts of the injured party. In this case, the plane crashed in Georgia. But that was not an act of the defendant. Neither was the flying and landing of the plane in Georgia an act of the defendant. The plane was under the exclusive control of the lessee. Defendant was, in essence, an airplane dealer and the fact that it was foreseeable that the party to whom it leased the plane would fly the plane to Georgia is an insufficient basis upon which to impose jurisdiction in Georgia. To do so would violate the nonresident defendant’s right to due process because it does not establish the required minimum contacts with this state. The facts of this case are similar to those in World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U. S. 286 (100 SC 559, 62 LE2d 490) (1980), in which the United States Supreme Court held that Oklahoma did not have jurisdiction over an automobile dealer and a regional automobile distributor, both located [810]

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McDonnell v. Roy E. Beatty & Associates, Inc.
418 S.E.2d 95 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1992)

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Bluebook (online)
418 S.E.2d 95, 203 Ga. App. 807, 92 Fulton County D. Rep. 110, 1992 Ga. App. LEXIS 643, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mcdonnell-v-roy-e-beatty-associates-inc-gactapp-1992.