J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro

J. McIntyre Machinery v. Nicastro

Argued January 11, 2011
Decided June 27, 2011
Full case name J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Robert Nicastro
Docket nos. 09-1343
Citations

564 U.S. ___ (more)

131 S.Ct. 2780, 180 L.Ed.2d 765
Holding
A court may not exercise jurisdiction over a defendant that has not purposefully availed itself of doing business in the jurisdiction or placed goods in the stream of commerce in the expectation they would be purchased in the jurisdiction.
Court membership
Case opinions
Plurality Kennedy, joined by Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas
Concurrence Breyer, joined by Alito
Dissent Ginsburg, joined by Sotomayor and Kagan
Laws applied
Due Process Clause

J. McIntyre Machinery v. Nicastro, 564 U.S. ___ (2011), was a decision by the United States Supreme Court which ruled that a court may not exercise jurisdiction over a defendant that has not purposefully availed itself of doing business in the jurisdiction or placed goods in the stream of commerce in the expectation they would be purchased in the jurisdiction.

Background

An accident severed four fingers off the right hand of Robert Nicastro, who was operating a recycling machine used to cut scrap metal.[1] A British company manufactured the machine and sold it through its exclusive U.S. distributor.[1] Nicastro sued J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd., the British company, and its U.S. distributor, McIntyre Machinery America, Ltd., in the Bergen County vicinage of the Law Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey, under a strict product liability theory.[2] The British parent company moved to dismiss the suit against it for lack of personal jurisdiction; the Law Division granted the motion.[3] The Appellate Division of the Superior Court reversed the dismissal;[3] the Supreme Court of New Jersey affirmed the Appellate Division's reversal of the Law Division's dismissal, holding that the foreign company had sufficient contacts with the state.[4]

Decision

In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court reversed the New Jersey Court, holding that the state court did not have jurisdiction. According to Justice Kennedy's plurality opinion, there were insufficient facts to show that J. McIntyre Machinery, the British Company, targeted New Jersey specifically. Although the company targeted the United States as a whole, only its distributor targeted the specific states. The stream of commerce theory is insufficient to give rise to jurisdiction without specific targeting of a specific state.

Justice Breyer, joined by Justice Alito, concurred in the judgment on narrower grounds. Rather than announce a broad rule, Breyer determined that based on the facts of this specific case New Jersey did not have jurisdiction because so few machines wound up in the state. However, Breyer was open to the possibility that if many machines were flowing into the state, the state might have jurisdiction even absent specific targeting.

Dissenting, Justice Ginsburg, joined by Justice Sotomayor and Justice Kagan, argued that by targeting the United States as a whole, the petitioner had targeted every state sufficiently to subject itself to New Jersey's jurisdiction.[5][6]

References

  1. 1 2 J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro, 131 S.Ct. 2780, 2786 (2011).
  2. Nicastro v. McIntyre Machinery America, Ltd., 987 A.2d 575, 577-78 (N.J. 2010).
  3. 1 2 Nicastro v. McIntyre Machinery America, Ltd., 987 A.2d 575, 578 (N.J. 2010).
  4. Nicastro v. McIntyre Machinery America, Ltd., 987 A.2d 575, 577 (N.J. 2010).
  5. "J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro 564 U.S. ___ (2010- )". Oyez: Chicago-Kent College of Law. Retrieved 31 October 2013.
  6. "J. McIntyre Machinery, Ltd. v. Nicastro 564 U.S. ___ (2010- )". Justia: The US Supreme Court Center. Retrieved 31 October 2013.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Sunday, February 21, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.