United States District Court, D. Connecticut
ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO DISMISS COMPLAINT
Jeffrey Alker Meyer United States District Judge.
A tree
branch fell on plaintiff Scott Herlihy while he was at his
daughter's wedding on the Caribbean island nation of
Saint Lucia. Unfortunately, Herlihy suffered severe and
disabling injuries. After returning home to Connecticut, he
filed this federal diversity lawsuit alleging claims for
negligence, recklessness, and public nuisance against two
foreign companies that he believes owned or operated the
resort property in Saint Lucia where he was injured. The
defendants have now moved to dismiss for multiple reasons
including lack of personal jurisdiction over them in the
District of Connecticut. I will grant their motion to
dismiss.
Background
The
following facts are relevant to the defendants' motion to
dismiss. Herlihy lived in Connecticut at the time of the
accident in June 2016 and the later filing of this lawsuit in
May 2018. He was injured by the fall of a tree branch while
at the Sandals Regency La Toc Golf Resort and Spa in Saint
Lucia. Defendant Sandals Resorts International, Ltd., is
incorporated in and has its principal place of business in
Jamaica. Defendant La Toc Holding Limited is incorporated in
and has its principal place of business in Saint
Lucia.[1]
Herlihy
alleges the following additional facts to support his claim
of personal jurisdiction in the District of Connecticut over
Sandals and La Toc. Doc. #23-2. When his daughter told him
she was planning a wedding at a Sandals resort in Saint
Lucia, he supported her decision because of his prior
knowledge about Sandals. Id. at 1. He was familiar
with Sandals from television advertisements that aired in
Connecticut, as well as from advertisements he saw in local
newspapers and in two fishing/boating magazines that were
delivered to his Connecticut home. Id. at 2.
Herlihy
contacted JetBlue airlines to book his flights, and a JetBlue
representative offered him the option of booking a stay
through JetBlue at one of three Sandals resorts on Saint
Lucia. Id. at 1. Herlihy decided to book his stay at
one of the Sandals resorts through JetBlue. Id. at
2.
The
papers filed by Herlihy do not state whether he was in
Connecticut at the time that he booked his travel to Saint
Lucia. As noted at oral argument, the Sandals resort where
Herlihy stayed in Saint Lucia was a different one from the
Sandals resort that hosted his daughter's wedding and
where the tree branch fell on him.
According
to materials submitted by the defendants and not disputed by
Herlihy, Sandals Resorts International, Ltd. provides
professional and management services to the particular resort
where Herlihy was injured. Neither Sandals nor La Toc are or
were incorporated in Connecticut or had any offices,
property, employees, agents, or other physical presence in
Connecticut. Doc. #14-2 at 2-5. Sandals and La Toc were not
registered to do business in Connecticut and have not paid
any taxes in Connecticut. Id. at 4-5.
Sandals
contracted with a Panamanian company known as Unique Travel
Corp. to conduct all of its worldwide marketing and
reservations. Id. at 6. Unique Travel Corp. in turn
subcontracted its marketing and promotion services to a
Delaware company named Unique Vacations, Inc., which operates
the Sandals worldwide website. Id. at 5-6.
Herlihy
has queried the Sandals' website to learn that Sandals
has relationships with two travel agents who are in Stamford
and Greenwich, Connecticut, as well as with a local business
development manager who serves the areas of Connecticut and
Rhode Island. Doc. #23 at 15. Herlihy does not allege that he
dealt with any any of these Connecticut-related agents or
that there is any connection between these agents and his
lawsuit.
Discussion
Rule
12(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure allows for a
civil defendant to move to dismiss a complaint on the ground
of lack of personal jurisdiction. When a defendant moves to
dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction, the plaintiff
bears the burden to make a prima facie showing that
jurisdiction exists, including averments of facts that-if
credited-would suffice to establish jurisdiction over the
defendant. See Charles Schwab Corp. v. Bank of Am.
Corp., 883 F.3d 68, 81 (2d Cir. 2018); SPV Osus Ltd.
v. UBS AG, 882 F.3d 333, 342 (2d Cir. 2018).
A court
may not exercise jurisdiction over a defendant if to do so
would violate the defendant's right to constitutional due
process. This protection has been defined in territorial
terms: a defendant is not subject to a lawsuit unless the
defendant has some connection-that is, “minimum
contacts”-to the territory that delimits the
court's jurisdiction. Thus, “due process requires
only that in order to subject a defendant to a judgment in
personam, if he be not present within the territory of the
forum, he have certain minimum contacts with it such that the
maintenance of the suit does not offend traditional notions
of fair play and substantial justice.” Int'l
Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U.S. 310, 316 (1945)
(cleaned up).
In more
recent years, the Supreme Court has refined the
“minimum contacts” inquiry in relevant part to
require that there either be a basis for general
jurisdiction or specific jurisdiction over a
defendant. What distinguishes these two concepts from one
another is the nature and degree of a defendant's
contacts to the territorial forum. On the one hand, for there
to be general jurisdiction, a defendant must be domiciled or
essentially at home within the court's territorial
district. On the other hand, for there to be specific
jurisdiction, the lawsuit must arise from or be related to
the defendant's contacts with the court's territorial
district. Either general jurisdiction or specific
jurisdiction must ...