Admiralty – Burden of proof

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U.S. Court of Appeals  For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Admiralty – Burden of proof

The district court correctly declined to shift the burden of proof, where the defendant lacked peculiar information unavailable to the plaintiff.

“For a number of reasons, we decline to apply this type of burden shifting in this case. First, the information at issue is not ‘peculiarly within the knowledge’ of Plano. Campbell, 365 U.S. at 96. In each of the above-cited cases where the burden of proof was shifted, the adversary itself had peculiar knowledge of the information at issue. Here, in contrast, not only does Plano lack ‘peculiar’ (i.e., ‘exclusive’) knowledge of the information at issue, it lacks any knowledge whatsoever—Plano simply has no information about how the shipping container was actually loaded. Appellants argue that Plano has a closer relationship with the foreign companies that possess this knowledge, and therefore that Plano has easier access to that information. Even if that is true, those companies are separate entities from Plano, and the mere fact that Plano may have a closer relation-ship with them does not bring this information peculiarly within Plano’s knowledge. Moreover, appellants have not demonstrated that Plano would actually be able to acquire the information at issue. The mere fact that Plano has, in the past, had contractual relationships with the foreign companies that possess the relevant information does not mean that Plano currently has unfettered access to that information. It is similarly irrelevant that a Plano vice-president has a personal home in the country where those companies are based. China is vast (over 9.5 million square kilometers) and has the largest population on earth; appellants fails to explain how Plano’s vice-president would have easy access to the information at issue. See Central Intelligence Agency, The World Factbook: China (2014), available at https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ch.html (last visited Mar. 3, 2015). In sum, fairness does not dictate that the burden of proof on this is-sue be shifted to a party with no actual knowledge of the relevant information and, it seems, no ready way to acquire it.”

Affirmed.

14-1171 & 14-1189 Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, Ltd., v. Plano Molding Co.

Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Leinenweber, J., Flaum, J.

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