At & T CORP. v. Sigala , 274 Ga. 137 ( 2001 )

Fletcher, Chief Justice.

Cruz Sigala, Ligia Pacheco de Perez and other citizens of the Republic of Venezuela filed these wrongful death and personal injury actions against AT&T Corporation and its Atlanta employees as a result of a 1993 gas pipeline explosion in Venezuela. The defendants moved to dismiss on the basis of forum non conveniens, which the trial court denied due to the absence of statutory authority. We granted AT&T’s petition for certiorari to consider whether a Georgia trial court has the inherent authority to dismiss a lawsuit that nonresident aliens bring for injuries occurring on foreign soil. Following the majority of states, we adopt the doctrine of forum non conveniens and hold that Georgia courts may exercise their inherent power and dismiss cases involving nonresident aliens when an adequate alternative forum exists and dismissal serves the interests of justice and convenience of the parties. Therefore, we reverse.

FACTS

A gas pipeline ruptured in Tejerías, Venezuela when a rotoex-cavator machine struck the line while digging a trench for a fiber-optic telephone cable. The explosion and resulting fire killed 50 people and injured many others. The Venezuelan plaintiffs filed ten other actions in the federal and state courts of California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, and New Jersey. AT&T removed this action from the State Court of Fulton County to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, which denied the plaintiffs’ motion to remand and granted AT&T’s motion to dismiss based on the doctrine of forum non conveniens.¹ The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed because of the lack of federal jurisdiction.²

On remand, the state court weighed the relevant factors identified in Gulf Oil Corporation v. Gilbert,³ concluding that there was an adequate alternative forum and public and private interests supported dismissing the action in favor of the courts of Venezuela. Despite this conclusion, the state court denied AT&T’s motion to dismiss because Georgia does not have a statute giving trial courts the discretion to decline to exercise jurisdiction under the doctrine of forum non conveniens. After the Court of Appeals for the State of Georgia denied AT&T’s application for interlocutory appeal, we granted certiorari.

FORUM NON CONVENIENS

The common-law doctrine of forum non conveniens is an equitable principle by which “a court having jurisdiction may decline to exercise it on considerations of convenience, efficiency, and justice.”⁴ Under federal case law, a district court has the discretion to dismiss a lawsuit when there is an adequate alternative forum in a foreign court and dismissal best serves the convenience of the parties and the ends of justice.⁵ The U.S. Supreme Court has identified relevant public and private interests to be considered in determining whether the plaintiff’s choice of forum should be honored.⁶ The private interests include the relative ease of access to sources of proof, the relative availability of compulsory process to secure the attendance of witnesses, the cost of obtaining-willing witnesses, the need to view the premises, the ability to enforce judgments, and other factors that make a trial expeditious and inexpensive.⁷ When courts are required to adjudicate disputes that have little connection to the chosen forum, the public interest factors include issues involving court congestion, jury duty, and choice of law.

Administrative difficulties follow for courts when litigation is piled up in congested centers instead of being handled at its origin. Jury duty is a burden that ought not to be imposed upon the people of a community which has no relation to the litigation. . . . There is a local interest in having localized controversies decided at home. There is an appropriateness, too, in having the trial. . . in a forum that is at home with the state law that must govern the case, rather than having a court in some other forum untangle problems in conflict of laws, and in law foreign to itself.⁸

Since the enactment of federal statutes permitting transfers between federal judicial districts, the doctrine applies in federal courts primarily when the alternative forum is a foreign court.⁹

Even though the common-law doctrine originated in the state courts,¹⁰ the vast majority of states now follow a standard similar to the federal rule.¹¹ These states permit their courts to refuse to exercise jurisdiction when the interests of justice and the convenience of the parties justify dismissal.¹² Most states have relied on their courts’ inherent judicial power in adopting the doctrine, although a few states have enacted statutes with a forum non conveniens provision.¹³

ADOPTION OF FORUM NON CONVENIENS UNDER GEORGIA LAW

This Court has the inherent power “to maintain a court system capable of providing for the administration of justice in an orderly and efficient manner.”¹⁴ Like our sister states, we exercise our inherent power only when established methods do not address a situation¹⁵ and courts are compelled to provide solutions that enable the litigative process to proceed smoothly.¹⁶

Relying on our inherent judicial power, we adopt the doctrine of forum non conveniens for use in lawsuits brought in our state courts by nonresident aliens who suffer injuries outside this country. First, we think trial courts should have the discretion to determine whether a tort action should remain on their dockets when it involves foreign plaintiffs. Unlike the previous cases where we have declined to apply the doctrine, this case does not involve a resident or citizen of Georgia or another state.¹⁷ Second, adoption of the doctrine permits our state courts to preserve their limited judicial resources to resolve controversies that have a reasonable connection to their jurisdiction. Third, adopting the doctrine places this state in line with both the federal courts and the majority of the states and thus discourages foreign plaintiffs from suing in Georgia courts to litigate their tort claims in an American court.¹⁸ As the U.S. Supreme Court has noted, the courts in our country are attractive to foreign plaintiffs because most states offer strict liability, jury trials are available, discovery is more extensive, contingent attorney’s fees are allowed, and losing parties are not taxed the costs of their opponents’ attorney’s fees.¹⁹

In adopting this doctrine, we reject the plaintiffs’ argument that the Georgia statutes concerning the rights of aliens gives Venezuelan citizens an equal right of access to our state courts.²⁰ Neither the United States Constitution nor the Georgia Constitution guarantees the same protections to aliens living outside this country that it gives citizens and aliens living within the borders of the United States.²¹ The Supreme Court has explained that it is the alien’s presence within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States that gives the judiciary the power to extend constitutional protections beyond citizens to aliens.²² Given the importance of an alien’s presence as a resident within this country to invoke the rights guaranteed to citizens, we conclude that OCGA §§ 1-2-10 and 1-2-11 apply to citizens of foreign countries who are residing within the United States and do not extend to nonresident aliens.

We also conclude that our recent decisions addressing the doctrine of forum non conveniens under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act do not prevent us from exercising our inherent powers here.²³ Unlike the Venezuelan citizens who brought these actions, the parties in those cases had an unqualified right under our constitution or federal statutes to litigate their claims in the courts of this state.²⁴ Although specific statutes codifying the doctrine will prevail over the common law, the absence of a statute generally permitting dismissal based on forum non conveniens does not prohibit us from adopting the doctrine in this international tort action. Because the trial court found that it lacked the inherent power to dismiss these cases under the doctrine of forum non conveniens, we reverse.

Judgment reversed.

All the Justices concur, except Benham and Carley, JJ, who dissent.

1 See Pacheco de Perez v. AT&T Co., No. 1:95-cv-2749-FMH (N.D. Ga. May 31, 1996).

2 See Pacheco de Perez v. AT&T Co., 139 F.3d 1368 (11th Cir. 1998).

3 330 U. S. 501 (67 SC 839, 91 LE 1055) (1947).

4 Atlantic Coast Line R.R. Co. v. Pope, 209 Ga. 187 (71 SE2d 243) (1952), rev’d on other grounds, 345 U. S. 379 (73 SC 749, 97 LE 1094) (1953).

5 See Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws § 84 (1971). See generally 17 Moore’s Federal Practice §§ 111.70 - 111.95 (3d ed. 2001).

6 See Gulf Oil Corp., 330 U. S. at 508.

7 See id.

8 Id.

9 See 17 Moore’s Federal Practice § 111.01.

10 See Gulf Oil, 330 U. S. at 505 n.4.

11 See Jacques E. Soiret, The Foreign Defendant: Overview of Principles Governing Jurisdiction, Venue, Extraterritorial Service of Process and Extraterritorial Discovery in U.S. Courts, 28 Tort & Ins. L.J. 533, 562 (1993).

12 See, e.g., Picketts v. International Playtex, Inc., 576 A2d 518, 524 (Conn. 1990); Kinney Sys. v. Continental Ins. Co., 674 So2d 86, 87 (Fla. 1996); McClain v. Ill. Cent. Gulf R.R. Co., 520 NE2d 368, 372 (Ill. 1988); Gonzales v. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Ry. Co., 371 P2d 193, 196 (Kan. 1962); Beaven v. McAnulty, 980 SW2d 284 (Ky. 1998); Johnson v. G.D. Searle & Co., 552 A2d 29, 30 (Md. 1989); Missouri Pac. R.R. v. Tircuit, 554 So2d 878 (Miss.1989); Gore v. United States Steel Corp., 104 A2d 670 (N.J. 1954); Silver v. Great Am. Ins. Co., 278 NE2d 619, 621 (N.Y. 1972); Chambers v. Merrell-Dow Pharm., 519 NE2d 370, 371 (Ohio 1988); Braten Apparel Corp. v. Bankers Trust Co., 259 SE2d 110, 113 (S.C. 1979); Zurick v. Inman, 426 SW2d 767, 768 (Tenn. 1968); Norfolk & W. Ry. Co. v. Tsapis, 400 SE2d 239, 242 (W. Va. 1990).

13 See Chambers, 519 NE2d at 372 n. 3 (listing 33 jurisdictions that had adopted the common-law rule through case law compared to six states that had enacted the doctrine by statute or rule as of 1988); see also OCGA § 19-9-47 (applying forum non conveniens doctrine as part of Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act).

14 Garcia v. Miller, 261 Ga. 531, 532 (408 SE2d 97) (1991).

15 See McCorkle v. Judges of Superior Court, 260 Ga. 315, 317 n.1 (392 SE2d 707) (1990) (Hunt, J., concurring).

16 See State v. Buckner, 527 SE2d 307 (N.C. 2000).

17 See Brown v. Seaboard Coast Line R.R. Co., 229 Ga. 481, 482 (192 SE2d 382) (1972) (privileges and immunities clause of U.S. Constitution prohibits Georgia courts from applying forum non conveniens doctrine to nonresident citizens of other states in cases under Federal Employers’ Liability Act, which has a special venue provision); see also Atlantic Coast Line R.R. Co. v. Wiggins, 77 Ga. App. 756, 759-760 (49 SE2d 909) (1948) (refusing to apply doctrine to Georgia resident).

18 See Kinney, 674 So2d at 87-89 (“Nothing in our law establishes a policy that Florida must be a courthouse for the world, nor that the taxpayers of the state must pay to resolve disputes utterly unconnected with this state’s interests.”).

19 See Piper Aircraft Co. v. Reyno, 454 U. S. 235, 252 n. 18 (102 SC 252, 70 LE2d 419) (1981).

20 See OCGA § 1-2-10 (rights of citizens of other nations to sue); OCGA § 1-2-11 (rights of aliens generally).

21 See Barge-Wagener Constr. Co. v. Morales, 263 Ga. 190, 192 (429 SE2d 671) (1993).

22 See Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U. S. 763, 770 (70 SC 936, 94 LE2d 1255) (1950).

23 See Patterson v. Patterson, 271 Ga. 306 (519 SE2d 438) (1999); Holtsclaw v. Holtsclaw, 269 Ga. 163 (496 SE2d 262) (1998).

24 See Early v. Early, 269 Ga. 415 (499 SE2d 329) (1998) (federal statutes placed exclusive jurisdiction of a child support modification action in Georgia); Holtsclaw, 269 Ga. at 165 (constitution gives husband the right to litigate his divorce action in the county of his residence); see also Patterson, 271 Ga. at 308 (trial court must determine whether Georgia is inconvenient forum for resident husband in child custody action under OCGA § 19-9-47 (a)).