Stan Sax Corp. v. Siefen Compounds, Inc., Docket No. 23561

• Decision Date: 17 May 1976
• Docket Number: Docket No. 23561
• Citation: 243 N.W.2d 724,68 Mich.App. 768
• Parties: STAN SAX CORPORATION, a Michigan Corporation, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. SIEFEN COMPOUNDS, INC., a Michigan Corporation, Defendant, and Carroll A. Murphy, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

Page 724

243 N.W.2d 724

68 Mich.App. 768

STAN SAX CORPORATION, a Michigan Corporation, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. SIEFEN COMPOUNDS, INC., a Michigan Corporation, Defendant, and Carroll A. Murphy, Defendant-Appellant.

Docket No. 23561.

Court of Appeals of Michigan.

May 17, 1976.

Rehearing Denied June 18, 1976.

Released for Publication July 19, 1976.

Colombo & Colombo by Louis J. Colombo, Jr., Birmingham, for murphy.

Noel A. Gage, Southfield, for plaintiff-appellee.

Before BASHARA, P.J., and R. B. BURNS and QUINN, JJ.

R. B. BURNS, Judge.

Plaintiff filed suit in Wayne County Circuit Court against the defendants. Defendant Murphy, who is a resident of the State of New York, filed a motion to dismiss the complaint against him for lack of jurisdiction. The trial judge denied his motion and he appealed to this Court by leave. We affirm.

Defendant Murphy was a manufacturer's representative for plaintiff. He serviced the Revere Copper and Brass Works in Rome, New York. All of his orders were placed by telephone or by mail.

Plaintiff alleges that Murphy breached his duties owed to plaintiff by representing defendant Siefen Compounds, Inc., which was in direct competition with the plaintiff. Plaintiff further alleges that Murphy engaged in fraudulent activities in misrepresenting plaintiff's status at Revere and by interfering with plaintiff's advantageous relationship with Revere.

The Supreme Court in Sifers v. Horen, 385 Mich. 195, 188 N.W.2d 623 (1971), stated that the statute represented an attempt by the Legislature to expand to its full potential limited personal jurisdiction of Michigan courts over nonresidents. M.C.L.A. § 600.705; M.S.A. § 27A.705. The statute uses the phrase: 'The transaction of any business within the state'.

In McGraw v. Matthaei, 340 F.Supp. 162 (E.D.Mich., 1972), Judge Kaess, Chief Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan, Southern Division, stated on page 164:

'Defendant has placed great emphasis on the fact that he was not physically present in the state when he executed the note. This court is of the opinion that one need not be physically present in the state to 'transact business within the state.'

'Modern technology has taken us far beyond the point where two men must stand in each other's physical presence to transact business. Widespread use of the telephone and the mails make actual physical presence unnecessary in many cases.'

Judge, now Justice Fitzgerald in Kiefer v. May, 46 Mich.App. 566, 572, 208 N.W.2d...