DePUY ORTHOPAEDICS, INC. and Johnson & Johnson, Appellants (Defendants below), v. Travis BROWN et al., Appellees (Plaintiffs below).
No. 49S02-1504-CT-225
Supreme Court of Indiana.
April 24, 2015.
Rehearing Denied July 15, 2015.
10 N.E.3d 567
MASSA, Justice.
Eric C. Lewis, Indianapolis, IN, Attorneys for appellees.
Plaintiffs Travis Brown et al. filed suit against DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc. in Marion Superior Court, alleging injuries related to certain hip replacement equipment. DePuy moved to transfer venue to Virginia and Mississippi on the grounds of forum non conveniens, pursuant to
Facts and Procedural History
DePuy Orthopaedics is an Indiana corporation, and its principal place of business is located in Warsaw, Kosciusko County, Indiana. From 2005 to 2010, DePuy sold a prosthetic hip implant throughout the United States known as the ASR™ XL Acetabular System. Plaintiffs are nineteen individuals who had the ASR™ XL
Standard of Review
Pursuant to
The Trial Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion in Denying DePuy‘s Motion to Dismiss Based on Forum Non Conveniens.
Our review is therefore limited to whether the decision was “clearly against the logic and effect of the facts and circumstances before the court.” Wright 989 N.E.2d at 330. The record on appeal reveals, at a minimum, the following facts supporting retaining Indiana as venue:
- DePuy is an Indiana corporation, whose principal place of business is in Indiana;
- DePuy is the responsible U.S. entity for the design, manufacture, label, distribution, marketing and sale of the ASR™ XL System;
- Indiana has a “manifest interest” in hearing disputes involving its citizens. See generally JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. v. Desert Palace, Inc., 882 N.E.2d 743, 752 (Ind.Ct.App.2008); McGee v. Int‘l Life Ins. Co., 355 U.S. 220, 223 (1957);
- Plaintiffs chose to file suit against DePuy in its home state, and their choice of forum is entitled to deference.4 Employers Ins. of Wausau v. Recticel Foam Corp., 716 N.E.2d 1015, 1021 (Ind.Ct.App.1999);
- At least seventeen depositions have already been conducted in Indiana;
- No evidence was presented that any witnesses located in Virginia or Mississippi will be unwilling or unable to come to Indiana to give testimony; and
- Although there are differences between the laws of Indiana, Virginia and Mississippi with respect to product liability, Indiana courts are capable of interpreting and applying those differences without significant difficulty.5 See, e.g.,
Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws § 6(2)(g) (1971) (stating that an appropriate choice-of-law consideration is “ease in the determination and application of the law to be applied“); Anyango, 971 N.E.2d at 658 (sustaining the motion to dismiss in part because the trial court “anticipated that there will be significant problems in dealing with resolving the application of Canadian law“).
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the trial court‘s denial of DePuy‘s motion to dismiss based on forum non conveniens, and remand this case to the trial court for further proceedings.
RUSH, C.J., and DICKSON, RUCKER, and DAVID, JJ., concur.
Notes
Trial Rule 4.4(C) states:
Jurisdiction under this rule is subject to the power of the court to order the litigation to be held elsewhere under such reasonable conditions as the court in its discretion may determine to be just.
In the exercise of that discretion the court may appropriately consider such factors as:
(1) Amenability to personal jurisdiction in this state and in any alternative forum of the parties to the action;
(2) Convenience to the parties and witnesses of the trial in this state and in any alternative forum;
(3) Differences in conflict of law rules applicable in this state and in the alternative forum; or
(4) Any other factors having substantial bearing upon the selection of a convenient, reasonable and fair place of trial.
In their pursuit of zealous advocacy, both parties attempt to describe this familiar standard to their advantage.
First, DePuy asserts that we “must independently review the record” using the factors listed in
Second, Plaintiffs claim that “Indiana Courts have emphasized time and again that the underlying purpose of the doctrine of forum non conveniens is to ‘permit a cause to be litigated in another state upon a showing that litigation in Indiana is so inconvenient that substantial injustice is likely to result.‘” Appellee Br. at 10 (citing Freemond v. Somma, 611 N.E.2d 684, 691 (Ind.Ct.App.1993)); see also Pet. to Trans. at 5. However, we expressly rejected this language in Anyango because it “conflict[s] with the explicit discretionary authority granted to the trial court in Trial Rule 4.4(C).” 971 N.E.2d at 656 n. 2.
DePuy argues that Plaintiffs’ choice of forum deserves no deference because Plaintiffs are not Indiana citizens or residents, and thus they have sued outside their “home forum,” akin to a foreign plaintiff. Resp. to Pet. to Trans. at 4-5 (citing Piper Aircraft Co. v. Reyno, 454 U.S. 235, 255-56 (1981)). A plaintiff‘s choice of forum, however, is inherently entitled to deference. See Euler v. Seymour Nat. Bank, 519 N.E.2d 1242, 1245 (Ind.Ct.App.1988) (“A plaintiff has the right to select an appropriate forum in which to litigate his claim and, once he has selected that forum, his choice should be given great weight.“); Gulf Oil Corp. v. Gilbert, 330 U.S. 501, 508 (1947) (“The court will weigh relative advantages and obstacles to fair trial.... But unless the balance is strongly in favor of the defendant, the plaintiff‘s choice of forum should rarely be disturbed.“). We relax that deferential standard with respect to foreign plaintiffs because every U.S. jurisdiction is presumptively equally convenient. See Anyango, 971 N.E.2d at 658 (“A foreign citizen that chooses Indiana as a forum rather than his own nation is entitled to a substantially diminished presumption that Indiana is a convenient forum.“).