Jeffers v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., CIV.A. 3:99-0274.

• Citation: 152 F.Supp.2d 913
• Decision Date: 19 July 2001
• Docket Number: No. CIV.A. 3:99-0274.,CIV.A. 3:99-0274.
• Parties: Tina Louise JEFFERS, Plaintiff, v. WAL-MART STORES, INCORPORATED, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of West Virginia

152 F.Supp.2d 913

Tina Louise JEFFERS, Plaintiff, v. WAL-MART STORES, INCORPORATED, et al., Defendants.

No. CIV.A. 3:99-0274.

United States District Court, S.D. West Virginia, Huntington Division.

July 19, 2001.

Stuart Calwell, John H. Scaggs, Calwell & McCormick, Charleston, WV, for Plaintiff.

Kimberly E. Williams, McQueen, Harmon & Potter, L.C., Charleston, WV James D. McQueen, Jr., McQueen Harmon & Potter, Charleston, WV, Regenia L. Mayne, McQueen Harmon & Potter, Charleston, WV, R. Scott Long, Barbara A. Allen, Hendrickson & Long, Charleston, WV, Michael B. Victorson, Jackson & Kelly, Charleston, WV, Paul T. Farrell, Jr., Farrell, Farrell & Farrell, L.C., Huntington, WV, Joseph M. Farrell, Jr., Paul T. Farrell, Asst. U.S. Atty., Farrell, Farrell & Farrell, Huntington, WV, Mike A. Freye, Jenkins, Fenstermaker, P.L.L.C., Huntington, WV, Thomas E. Scarr, Michael A. Freye, Jenkins Fenstermaker, Huntington, WV, Anthony P. Tokarz, Phyllis M. Potterfield, Bowles, Rice, McDavid, Graff & Love, Charleston, WV, Charles M. Love, III, Bowles Rice McDavid Graff & Love, Charleston, WV, Marc E. Williams, Huddleston, Bolen, Beatty, Porter & Copen, Huntington, WV, Dean T. Barnhard, Joseph G. Eaton, Barnes & Thornburg, Indianapolis, IN, Thomas E. Scarr, Mike A. Freye, Jenkins, Fenstermaker, P.L.L.C., Huntington, WV, Michael M. Fisher, Offutt, Fisher & Nord, Charleston, WV, James D. McQueen, Jr., McQueen Harmon & Potter, Charleston, WV, for Defendants.

ORDER

CHAMBERS, District Judge.

Pending before the Court is the January 2, 2001 motion of Defendant C.L. Smith Container Company (C.L. Smith) to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. Because exercise of personal jurisdiction by this Court over Defendant C.L. Smith would violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as more thoroughly discussed below, the Court GRANTS Defendant's motion.

I. Standard

Although the defendant is the moving party in a motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction, the plaintiff bears the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant has sufficient minimum contacts to sustain the Court's jurisdiction over the defendant. See Mylan Labs. Inc. v. Akzo, N.V., 2 F.3d 56, 59-60 (4th Cir.1993) (citing Combs v. Bakker, 886 F.2d 673, 676 (4th Cir.1989)). The Mylan court recognized that when:

the district court decides a pretrial personal jurisdiction dismissal motion without an evidentiary hearing, the plaintiff need prove only a prima facie case of personal jurisdiction. In deciding whether the plaintiff has proved a prima facie case of personal jurisdiction, the district court must draw all reasonable inferences arising from the proof, and resolve all factual disputes, in the plaintiff's favor.

Id. at 60 (internal citations omitted). In this case, although no evidentiary hearing was held, Plaintiff conducted significant discovery over a period of nearly four months, and the filings for this motion alone amount to some 280 pages. As fully set forth below, the Court finds that, even drawing all reasonable inferences arising from the proof and resolving all factual disputes in Plaintiff's favor, Plaintiff has not borne the burden of proving a prima facie case of personal jurisdiction.

II. Background

In her second amended complaint, Plaintiff Tina Louise Jeffers, an employee of Defendant Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., alleges that on April 10, 1997, she suffered harm as the result of exposure to chemicals when she was directed to clean up a spill of pesticide products in the Barboursville, West Virginia, Wal-Mart store's lawn and garden area. The products apparently had fallen off of a shelf and, when they hit the floor, had broken open and spilled their contents. On April 9, 1999, Plaintiff sued, inter alia, the manufacturers of the pesticides products and of their containers on various products liability theories.

Defendant C.L. Smith was added to the suit by Plaintiff's second amended complaint on November 6, 2000. On January 2, 2001, C.L. Smith moved, pursuant to Rule 12(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, to dismiss Plaintiff's amended complaint against it on the grounds that this Court lacks personal jurisdiction over C.L. Smith. Plaintiff filed her response on January 23, 2001 and, after additional discovery was had, her supplemented response on May 18, 2001. Defendant C.L. Smith filed its original reply on February 8, 2001 and its supplemented reply/motion on May 24, 2001.

The following facts, taken from the original and supplemental affidavits of Clarence L. Smith (Defendant C.L. Smith's president and owner), are apparently not disputed by Plaintiff, and, except as noted, the Court accepts them as established for the purposes of the pending motion. C.L. Smith is a Missouri corporation with its principal place of business in Saint Louis, Missouri. The company's primary business is the distribution of various containers, although it also occasionally manufacturers the containers it sells. C.L. Smith has never directly distributed its products to customers in West Virginia; furthermore, C.L. Smith does not know where its products are redistributed by its direct customers. In this case, C.L. Smith apparently sold its bottles to Defendant United Industries Corp., which then filled those bottles with pesticides and resold the full bottles through, inter alia, Defendant Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

C.L. Smith has never been a domiciliary or resident corporation of West Virginia, it has never registered to do business in West Virginia, and it has never owned or controlled any corporations in West Virginia. C.L. Smith has never owned real or personal property in West Virginia, and it has never maintained bank accounts or telephone listings in West Virginia. The company has never employed any salespeople or other personnel in West Virginia, and it does not maintain an agent for service of process here. Finally, while C.L. Smith claims that it has never directly advertised in West Virginia, never solicited business here, and never distributed any products here, those claims are more in the nature of conclusions and are discussed more fully below.

III. Analysis

Normally, determining the propriety of the exercise of personal jurisdiction over a non-resident defendant like C.L. Smith requires a two-step inquiry: (1) whether a statute authorizes service of process on the non-resident defendant, and (2) whether such service of process comports with the Due Process Clause. See In re Celotex Corp., 124 F.3d 619 (4th Cir.1997); Mylan Labs., Inc., 2 F.3d at 60; FED. R. CIV. P. 4. As the Fourth Circuit recognized in In re Celotex, though, "[b]ecause the West Virginia long-arm statute is coextensive with the full reach of due process, it is unnecessary ... to go through the normal two-step formula for determining the existence of personal jurisdiction. Rather, the statutory inquiry necessarily merges with the Constitutional inquiry." 124 F.3d at 627-28 (citations omitted). Accordingly, the only question before this Court is whether the exercise of personal jurisdiction over C.L. Smith would be consistent with the Due Process Clause.

In Lesnick v. Hollingsworth & Vose Co., 35 F.3d 939, 941 (4th Cir.1994), the Fourth Circuit traced the history of Supreme Court jurisprudence on this question and observed that the exercise of personal jurisdiction over a person not physically present in the forum state is consistent with the Due Process clause if that person "(1) ha[s] certain minimum contacts or ties with the forum state such that (2) maintenance of the suit does not offend traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice." 35 F.3d at 942 (citing Int'l Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U.S. 310, 316, 66 S.Ct. 154, 90 L.Ed. 95 (1945)).¹ Cases since International Shoe, the court noted, have further refined the two-pronged test:

In [Hanson v. Denckla, 357 U.S. 235, 78 S.Ct. 1228, 2 L.Ed.2d 1283 (1958)], the Court limited those "minimum contacts" necessary to confer jurisdiction to those activities of an out-of-state person by which the person "purposely avails itself of the privilege of conducting activities within the forum state." 357 U.S. at 253, 78 S.Ct. 1228. This occurs where the contacts "proximately result from actions by the defendant himself that create a `substantial connection' with the forum state," Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462, 475, 105 S.Ct. 2174, 85 L.Ed.2d 528 (1985) (quoting [McGee v. Int'l Life Ins. Co., 355 U.S. 220, 223, 78 S.Ct. 199, 2 L.Ed.2d 223 (1957)]) (emphasis in original), or where the defendant's efforts are "purposefully directed" at the state. Id. at 476, 105 S.Ct. 2174.

35 F.3d at 942-43 (parallel citations omitted); see also World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U.S. 286, 297, 100 S.Ct. 559, 62 L.Ed.2d 490 (1980); ESAB Group, Inc. v. Centricut, Inc., 126 F.3d 617, 622 (4th Cir.1997) (ESAB I).

A. Specific and General Jurisdiction

Because the claimed injury in this case arose from Defendant C.L. Smith's alleged contacts with the forum state of West Virginia, this Court can look either to specific jurisdiction or general jurisdiction over C.L. Smith. See ESAB I, 126 F.3d at 623-24 (recognizing that general jurisdiction, needed where jurisdiction over defendant does not arise from that defendant's contacts with forum state, may be asserted over defendant whose activities in forum state have been "continuous and systematic," whereas specific jurisdiction may arise out of significantly lower threshold level of minimum contacts (quoting Helicopteros Nacionales de Colombia, S.A. v. Hall, 466 U.S. 408, 414-15, 104 S.Ct. 1868, 80 L.Ed.2d 404 (1984) (quoting Shaffer v. Heitner, 433 U.S. 186, 204, 97 S.Ct. 2569, 53 L.Ed.2d 683 (1977)))); id. at 624 ("The contacts related to the cause of action must create a `substantial connection' with the forum state ..., although this connection need not be as extensive as is necessary for general jurisdiction.") (quoting McGee...