David Ogden, David Bowker, Karin Dryhurst and Apoorva Patel authored a chapter in the International Comparative Legal Guide to: Enforcement of Foreign Judgments 2020 on “The Personal Jurisdiction Filter in the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments in the United States.”
In the chapter, the authors explore potential issues in a US court’s scrutiny of whether a foreign court had personal jurisdiction sufficient to meet US standards for recognition and enforcement. The authors also offer guidance for holders of non-US judgments or litigants in foreign court proceedings who anticipate actions in the United States to recognize and enforce a foreign judgment. Topics of discussion include:
- An overview of the legal regime governing the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments in the United States.
- The issue of what law applies to a US court’s assessment of the foreign court’s exercise of personal jurisdiction over the defendant.
- US courts’ process of identifying, interpreting and applying foreign law as part of the personal jurisdiction analysis.
- Ways in which a defendant’s decision on how to proceed in the foreign litigation can have implications on potential personal jurisdiction defenses in subsequent US recognition and enforcement proceedings.
- Recent trends in the jurisprudence, in particular how service-of-process requirements in the foreign jurisdiction and the presence of a contractual forum-selection clause designating the foreign forum affect a US court’s assessment of the foreign court’s personal jurisdiction.
Excerpt: In today’s global business landscape, plaintiffs who obtain court judgments outside the United States against defendants who are based, or have significant assets, in the United States may seek to enforce such judgments in the United States. In these circumstances, U.S. courts asked to recognise and enforce foreign court judgments generally apply “jurisdictional filters”, among other criteria that govern recognition and enforcement, to assess whether the non-U.S. or “foreign” court that rendered the judgment at issue properly exercised jurisdiction in the underlying case. If a U.S. court determines that the foreign court did not have personal jurisdiction over the defendant in the original litigation, the U.S. court will not recognise or enforce the foreign judgment. In U.S. courts, the task of determining whether a foreign court had personal jurisdiction sufficient to meet U.S. standards for recognition and enforcement is not always straightforward. This chapter explores a number of complex issues that may arise in a U.S. court’s scrutiny of this question. This chapter also offers guidance for holders of non-U.S. judgments or litigants in foreign court proceedings who anticipate actions in the United States to recognise and enforce a foreign judgment.
