Case Title: Ex Parte Alloy Wheels Intern., Ltd.

Citation: 882 So. 2d 819

Docket Number: 1020778

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 2003-11-21T00:00:00Z

Document:
882 So. 2d 819 (2003)
Ex parte ALLOY WHEELS INTERNATIONAL, LTD.
(In re Sue S. Vance, as personal representative of the estate of Katherine Victoria Vance, deceased
v.
Sonic-Williams Imports, Inc., d/b/a Tom Williams Land Rover; et al.)
1020778.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
November 21, 2003.
*821 Thomas S. Rue, Tracy P. Turner, and William H. Hardie, Jr., of Johnstone, Adams, Bailey, Gordon & Harris, L.L.C., Mobile; an Nathan G. Watkins, Jr., Livingston, for petitioner.
D. Bruce Petway and Rodney F. Barganier of Lucas, Wash, Petway, Tucker & Stephens, P.C., Birmingham; and David T. Shaw of Griess & Shaw, Eutaw, for respondent (Sue S. Vance).
JOHNSTONE, Justice.
The defendant Alloy Wheels International, Ltd., a foreign corporation engaged in manufacturing aluminum alloy wheels, petitions this Court for a writ of mandamus directing the trial judge to vacate his order denying the motion of Alloy Wheels for a summary judgment grounded on lack of personal jurisdiction. Alloy Wheels asks this Court to issue a writ of mandamus directing the trial judge to issue an order granting a summary judgment in favor of Alloy Wheels. Because the materials before us establish that the trial court lacked personal jurisdiction over Alloy Wheels, we grant the petition and issue the writ.
On September 26, 1999, Katherine Victoria Vance was killed in the rollover wreck of her 1998 Land Rover Discovery sport-utility vehicle. On September 10, 2001, Katherine's mother, Sue Vance, as the personal representative of Katherine's estate, sued a number of defendants, and eventually added Alloy Wheels as a defendant, for Katherine's wrongful death. The plaintiff alleged product liability claims and Alabama Extended Manufacturer's Liability Doctrine claims against the defendants. The plaintiff specifically alleged that Alloy Wheels had defectively designed and manufactured the aluminum alloy wheels on Katherine's Land Rover and that a crack in at least one of the wheels caused the fatal wreck. Answering the amended complaint, Alloy Wheels asserted, among other defenses, the lack of personal jurisdiction.
Thereafter, Alloy Wheels moved for a summary judgment on the ground that the trial court lacked personal jurisdiction over Alloy Wheels. Alloy Wheels relied on the allegations of the complaint and on two affidavits of Paul Merritt, the operations director of Alloy Wheels in the United Kingdom. Alloy Wheels argued that it did not have sufficient minimum contacts with the State of Alabama for the trial court to exercise personal jurisdiction over Alloy Wheels.
The plaintiff submitted a brief and evidentiary materials in opposition to the motion for summary judgment. The brief submitted by the plaintiff is not among the materials before us, but the evidentiary submissions are.
"[M]andamus is a drastic and extraordinary writ that will be issued only when there is: (1) a clear legal right in the petitioner to the order sought; (2) an imperative *822 duty upon the respondent to perform, accompanied by a refusal to do so; (3) the lack of another adequate remedy; and (4) properly invoked jurisdiction of the court." Ex parte Horton, 711 So. 2d 979, 983 (Ala.1998). "Subject to certain narrow exceptions ..., the denial of a motion to dismiss or a motion for a summary judgment is not reviewable by petition for writ of mandamus." Ex parte Liberty Nat'l Life Ins. Co., 825 So. 2d 758, 761 (Ala.2002) (citing Ex parte Jackson, 780 So. 2d 681, 684 (Ala.2000)). One of the exceptions is the denial of a motion grounded on a claim of lack of personal jurisdiction, Ex parte Sekeres, 646 So. 2d 640 (Ala.1994), Ex parte Paul Maclean Land Servs., 613 So. 2d 1284 (Ala.1993), and Ex parte Volkswagenwerk Aktiengesellschaft, 443 So. 2d 880 (Ala.1983).
Brewer v. Woodall, 608 So. 2d 370, 372 (Ala.1992).
Young v. La Quinta Inns, Inc., 682 So. 2d 402, 403 (Ala.1996).
Ex parte McInnis, 820 So. 2d 795, 802-03 (Ala.2001) (quoting Sudduth v. Howard, 646 So. 2d 664, 667 (Ala.1994)). Rule 4.2(a) provides, in pertinent part:
In Ex parte McInnis, this Court explained the application of the stream of commerce doctrine to a products liability case:
Ex parte McInnis, 820 So. 2d  at 803-04 (most original emphasis omitted; new emphasis added).
The affidavit dated July 31, 2002, sworn by Merritt, and submitted by Alloy Wheels states, in pertinent part:
The affidavit dated on August 2, 2002, sworn by Merritt, and submitted by Alloy Wheels states, in pertinent part:
Because Alloy Wheels submitted sufficient evidence to establish a prima facie case of lack of personal jurisdiction, the burden shifted to the plaintiff to present evidence to establish minimum contacts by Alloy Wheels with Alabama sufficient for the trial court to exercise personal jurisdiction. While the plaintiff submitted some evidentiary materials in opposition to the motion for summary judgment filed by Alloy Wheels, none of the plaintiff's materials refutes the statements of fact sworn by Merritt in the affidavits submitted by Alloy Wheels.
*827 The plaintiff relies on Smith v. Yanmar Diesel Engine Co., 855 So. 2d 1039 (Ala.2003), Bryant v. Ceat, 406 So. 2d 376 (Ala.1981), and Mann v. Hrubetz, 361 So. 2d 1021 (Ala.1978), to support her claim of sufficient contacts between Alloy Wheels and the State of Alabama. These cases are materially distinguishable from the case now before us in that, in each of the former, the defendant-foreign-manufacturer "purposefully directed" its actions toward Alabama and thus met the test that "the defendant should have reasonably anticipated that [it] would be sued in" Alabama, McInnis, supra, at 803.
In Smith, the defendant-foreign-manufacturer of tractors, Yanmar, stipulated that it "`sold and continues to sell genuine Yanmar parts in Alabama through authorized Yanmar dealers in Alabama.'" Smith, 855 So. 2d  at 1041. In Bryant, the sales records of the defendant-foreign-manufacturer of tires, Ceat, showed that Ceat had sent, through its distributer Duddy's Inc., over 13,000 tires to David Tire Company in Birmingham, Alabama. Bryant, 406 So. 2d  at 378. In Mann, the defendant-foreign-manufacturer of carnival rides sold a carnival ride to an Alabama carnival business, Century 21 Shows, Inc., located in North Birmingham, Alabama. The Mann Court held that, although the sale itself did not occur in Alabama, the defendant had sufficient minimum contacts with Alabama for the trial court to exercise personal jurisdiction over the defendant because the defendant could reasonably have anticipated that injuries would result from the operation of the ride in Alabama.
The plaintiff now before us argues that the evidence establishes an intent or purpose in Alloy Wheels to serve, in the words of its brief, "the American market." Evidence of an intent or purpose to serve "the American market," however, absent evidence of "an intent or purpose to serve the market in the forum State," does not establish the "action of the defendant purposefully directed toward the forum State" that would constitute contact sufficient to warrant the exercise of personal jurisdiction over the defendant by the forum state. McInnis, supra, at 804 (quoting Asahi Metal Industry Co., Ltd. v. Superior Court of California, Solano County, 480 U.S. 102, 112, 107 S. Ct. 1026, 94 L. Ed. 2d 92 (1987)). On the contrary, the plaintiff now before us has not submitted substantial evidence that Alloy Wheels "purposefully directed" any action "at the forum State [other] than the mere act of placing a product in the stream of commerce." World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U.S. 286, 100 S. Ct. 559, 62 L. Ed. 2d 490 (1980), Asahi, and McInnis, supra. No evidence establishes sufficient minimum contacts between Alloy Wheels and the State of Alabama.
Therefore, Alloy Wheels has shown a clear legal right to mandamus relief. We grant the petition of Alloy Wheels and issue a writ of mandamus directing the trial court to vacate its order denying the motion of Alloy Wheels for summary judgment and to enter an order granting the motion on the ground of lack of personal jurisdiction.
PETITION GRANTED; WRIT ISSUED.
HOUSTON, SEE, BROWN, HARWOOD, WOODALL, and STUART, JJ., concur.
LYONS, J., concurs specially.
LYONS, Justice (concurring specially).
I concur fully in the main opinion. I write specially to note that in Smith v. Yanmar Diesel Engine Co., 855 So. 2d 1039, 1042 (Ala.2003), this Court observed that a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(2), Ala. R. Civ. P., for lack of jurisdiction over the person is "a more appropriate procedural vehicle" for resolving issues *828 of personal jurisdiction. According to 10A Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2713 (3d ed.1998), a summary judgment applies to an adjudication of the merits of a case, and a court lacking jurisdiction has no power to enter a judgment.
That portion of Rule 12 mandating that a motion to dismiss is converted to a motion for a summary judgment pursuant to Rule 56, Ala. R. Civ. P., when matters outside the pleadings are presented applies only to motions to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. I would permit a Rule 12(b)(2) motion to be accompanied by matters outside the pleadings so long as an adequate opportunity to respond, comparable to the practice under Rule 56, is permitted. However, it would exalt form over substance to allow concerns over the proper nomenclature to interfere with the appellate disposition of this proceeding. Nevertheless, out of an abundance of caution, it should be noted that, unlike the typical effect of a summary judgment going to the merits, the summary judgment in this case resolves only the amenability of Alloy Wheels to jurisdiction in an Alabama court and is not an adjudication on the merits of Vance's claims.