Personal Injury – Foreign Soverign Immunities Act

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Supreme Court of the United States

Case No. 13-1067

Case Name: OBB Personenverkehr AG v. Sachs

Practice Area: Personal Injury – Foreign Soverign Immunities Act

Personal injury suit stemming from injury incurred by Sachs falling on tracks barred by sovereign immunity.

“The Ninth Circuit apparently derived its one-element test from an overreading of one part of one sentence in Nelson, in which we observed that “the phrase [‘based upon’] is read most naturally to mean those elements of a claim that, if proven, would entitle a plaintiff to relief under his theory of the case.” 507 U. S., at 357. We do not see how that mention of elements—plural—could be considered an endorsement of a one-element test, nor how the particular element the Ninth Circuit singled out for each of Sachs’s claims could be construed to entitle her to relief. Be that as it may, our analysis in Nelson is flatly incompatible with a one-element approach. A one-element test necessarily requires a court to identify all the elements of each claim in a complaint before that court may reject those claims for falling outside §1605(a)(2). But we did not undertake such an exhaustive claim-by-claim, element-by-element analysis of the Nelsons’ 16 causes of action, nor did we engage in the choice-of-law analysis that would have been a necessary prelude to such an undertaking. Compare id., at 356–358, with 737 F. 3d, at 600, n. 14 (noting disagreement over whether state or federal common law principles govern suits under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act).”

Unanimous Decision

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.