Background

• Plaintiffs (victims of the USS Cole bombing) sued the Republic of Sudan under the FSIA and attempted service under 28 U.S.C. § 1608(a)(3) by certified mail addressed to Sudan's Minister of Foreign Affairs at Sudan's embassy in Washington, D.C.
• The clerk mailed the service packet return-receipt requested; a signed receipt was returned and Sudan did not appear, so the district court entered a default judgment and later turnover orders in New York to seize Sudanese assets.
• Sudan appeared only to challenge personal jurisdiction, arguing § 1608(a)(3) requires mailing to the foreign minister at the minister's office in the foreign state (e.g., Khartoum), not to an embassy in the U.S.
• The Second Circuit upheld service to the embassy; the Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a circuit split about whether mailing to a foreign minister at an embassy satisfies § 1608(a)(3).
• The Supreme Court held that § 1608(a)(3) is most naturally read to require that the service packet be addressed and dispatched to the foreign minister at the minister's office in the foreign state (not to the embassy in the U.S.).

Issues

Key Cases Cited

• Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories, Ltd. v. Novo Nordisk A/S, 566 U.S. 399 (statutory interpretation starts with the text)
• United States v. Ron Pair Enterprises, Inc., 489 U.S. 235 (same canon of interpretation)
• Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306 (due-process standard for notice)
• Rosenthal v. Walker, 111 U.S. 185 (mailbox rule / dispatch concept)
• Breard v. Greene, 523 U.S. 371 (treaty conflicts and supremacy)
• Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (treaty and constitutional relationship)