CCL Files En Banc Brief Arguing to Overturn 2016 Decision
August 2nd, 2021In a supplemental brief filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, CCL's Robert S. Peck asked the court to overturn a 2016 decision on personal jurisdiction that stands in the way of litigating seven deaths and 40 injuries to U.S. Navy personnel when a container ship struck the U.S.S. Fitzgerald, a U.S. Navy destroyer in 2017 in the Sea of Japan.
The case was originally dismissed in federal district court in New Orleans because the judge ruled that the Japanese company operating the container ship was not subject to personal jurisdiction in the United States because it is not "at home" in this country. On appeal, Peck argued that the "at-home" requirement essentially rendered a federal rule of civil procedure unconstitutional as a product of due process, effectively saying that the Supreme Court and Congress got it wrong when Rule 4(k)(2) was promulgated. A panel of the Fifth Circuit agreed with him, but found that a 2016 precedent was an obstacle to ruling in the sailors' favor under the rule of orderliness.
Peck petitioned the Fifth Circuit to take up the matter en banc, where it would have the authority to overrule the errant precedent. The court agreed to do so, and today's filing was a supplemental brief in support of why the precedent should be overruled. Oral argument before the 17 members of the Court is scheduled for September 21. The case is Douglass v. Nippon Yusen Kabishiski Kusen.
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