table of your honors i'd like to reserve three minutes for a bottle if i might try to keep track of your time thank you thank you we understand that justice takes time your honors but in light of greenfield's aggressive collection activities and we see anna we asked that the court proceed as expeditiously as it can and issue an opinion i do need to make one correction of fact in opening brief at pages five and six we stated that appellant plural removed the case from state court federal court that was incorrect salus and company and initially there is an old sherlock holmes story the key clue of which is the dog that didn't bark in this case your honour's the dog that did not mark can be found in the court docket the court's decision in beecher vs was established that any prior state court process becomes normal and void upon removal and that's because of the well settled rule that federal procedure governs undisputed fact in this case is greenfield did not personally serve mr salicylate state court process until after removal they served him october ninth two thousand and thirteen well after remov the state court process served on mr sallust personally was there for goal and for it the trial court ignored beecher motion to dismiss so then we go to the next question was salaf and company served prior to removal the complaint was the same right but you've heard the complaint was the same k and the the trial court initially granted i think this is important the trial court initially granted the motion to dismiss by salus and company  because the state court process was defective that is to say they did not serve it properly the court trial court agreed with that but then the trial court reconsidered and what was the basis for that reconsideration the trial court based its reconsideration on a conclusion that the post remove all service of the state court process on mr sallis on october ninth two thousand and thirteen cured the defective service on salus and company now greenfield that distinguished beach or one basis they asserted that mr selous had notice of the state court action through the defective service on salus and company but their argument is that two wrongs make a right to defective service a process somehow are transformed into an effective service a process it's a circular argument yachters and i'd ask that you reject it kelso before you get too much into your time i'd appreciate your addressing the question that we asked the parties to address had an oral argument which is whether the feel worn was properly made under washington law as distinct from under federal law i'm not sure i quite sure your question probably we had to shoot an order on april second asking the parties to discuss how johnson versus groom affects the question whether there were a proper fe warning under washington statutes i thought you were referring to fiori f i f o i'm sorry that's why i did speak out of i appreciate the court having alerted us to john's neither party i think cited the arbiter arbitration clause in johnson provided that arbitration was to be conducted in and subject to enforcement pursuant to california law here the arbitration clause provides shall in all respects be interpreted construed as that or under the laws of the state of washington two sentences earlier in the same arbitration paragraph your honor it provides each party shall bear its own legal fees and costs now that is code of the wife set forth regardie civil rules for those so i think that pretty much for clothes is that we made that argument in our  it also doesn't say anything about enforcement of an award and that of course differs from the clause in johnson now remember of course this is greenfields form contract they do not get the benefit of any ambiguity honor i really don't want to to short circuit as i don't want to push back to too hard i understand you want me to move on under beecher  defective under that situation under washington law both of habermann versus washing public power supply the whoops cases everybody calls  t says that morris vs pollutes river says that the proper procedure is very simple greenfield knew that had a problem we told him every step of the way you've got a problem then an easy procedure which beach or itself points out is to have proper service issued by the federal court and then serve and they didn't do that they had ample side it is true that a party to a commercial contract can contractually consent to jurisdiction regardless of whether minimum contracts contacts exist mr sallis was never a party a signatory if you will to these contracts consent to jurisdiction in a commercial contract bind a non signatory to that jurisdiction with out any personal contacts an axiom foods vs a circuit international at no idea how to pronounce ace or camp concluded that non signatories had not waived their objections to personal jurisdiction regardless signatory based upon privity this is jurisdiction and did the court have jurisdiction over mr salazar personally when he's not a signatory of the contract where he has not consent jurisdiction he had no context let me give you an example i want to give a hypothetical let's assume an attorney at a large firm as opposed to a sole practitioner gates and both don't gates retains an expert witness or call this expert let me ask you though mr sallust the only principle i've sousing company yes so it would be as if there were oil spill expert on behalf of the firm's client the oil spill spill experts retainer agreement appeared as follows client both going gates p l c selous and company c by big a lawyer as principal camillo sells the third as principal that's exactly what this contract says exactly and included a consent jurisdiction in louisiana let's say at the demise of bogle in gates it did not pay oil spill expert or it went bankrupt it did not pay within jurisdictional limitations would the louisiana courts be able to exercise personal jurisdiction over big boy or person who had never set foot moat louisiana never done business and wheezy any it had no contact whatsoever with louisiana except for the fact but just so i apologize i would use want to save one time one more point on interest and i'll be done with two minutes left i think it should be clear by now that the trial court entered in  interest award for post judgment interest and it's true that i want to address of bleakly council's argument should've raised this in the trial court and it's tr we didn't do that we preserve it however on appeal and conduct in the way that the fell of fidelity federal bank case that you should you and we also filed the sixty two point one motion which was a new experience for me now i can only attribute that to ignorance on my part and on the part of mr sallust we were not familiar with the application of twenty eight u s code  to an arbitration but let me say if we were ignorant we were in good company rule three point three of the rules of professional conduct require that opposing counsel disclose to the district court controlling legal authority directly at vers to the client's position even if not raised by the opposition greenfields counsel had an obligation to have pointed that out to the court they did not and i ought to also lower the cody and before i stepped thank you and with me counsel table is eleanor wall stead an attorney in my office before i follow the counsel into the weeds on some of these arguments i would like to step back and take a look at the big picture here in this case attorney sallis purchased services in reports from a washington state consultant received those services used them in his court filings and did not pay for them if this case is dismissed he will get a windfall and greenfield will be severely damaged now as we know this is an arbitration case and courts are very deferential with arbitration decisions and the scope of review is exceedingly narrow asked for a trade well initially we sought arbitration and that's an important point that i wanted to point out here the first thing that we did was we sent a letter to mr sallis by certified mail and that letter was received and signed by daisy there was no response so then we initiated an arbitration with the washing arbitration mediation service and attempted to serve mr solace in louisiana florida and texas and our service process or even spoke with mr sallis on the phone but was not ever able to reach him consequently we determined that he was a avoiding service a process and b did not want to arbitrate so we started an action shorter answer to the question i just thank you mr solace personally remove the case to federal district court question was who asked for which gratian and then mr sallis moved her to compel arbitration so i hear but i do want the court to know that we sometimes all we're asking is what time it is we don't need to know how to build a clock i understand but i do want the court to understand that we did seek arbitration initially and this  a game of cat and mouse for six years the purchase and the professional service agreements say it says that bills unpaid after thirty days will accrue interest at the rate of eighteen court case the court looked at whether the agreement between the parties made an express a clear intent to apply washington law or to apply the state law and we believe that in fact what happened in this case under these agreements and there are multiple agreements the number of the parties are to this contract it's clear that they agreed arbitration and as a general matter that they agreed to the application of washington law it's not so clear whether they agreed to the application of washington law on arbitration so let me address that you the contract the professional service agreements kane contains to the choice of law provisions there is a general one in section eighteen that applies to the entire contract and then in section ten there is the arbitration clause itself and in that closet it says procedure for the arbitration shall be governed by washington's king county superior court civil rules and the rules of evidence then it says in the arbitration clause separately that this agreement shell in all respects be interpreted construed and governed by the laws of the state of washington it also says each party shall bear it rule fees and costs correct that's correct and are you addressing now the gramma issue about exact question really not wasn't really your question it was just the sort of skipped over that between the two things yes i didn't i didn't think i was going to all of it but if if you think it is i will address it no the point that i want to make here is that this clause specifically addresses procedural and substantive laws and it attempts in a very broad way to state that all aspects of this arbitration will be governed by washington law and that is distinguishable from other cases that have been cited in this case where there's just a simple choice of law provision here there is that simple choice of law provision but there is an additional arbitration provision that is very specific about both such that and procedural law and for that reason we believe that washington law is the choice of law regarding jurisdiction personal jurisdiction yes sallust did consent to personal jurisdiction in washington the arbitration agreement specifies that the hearing must take place in washington on april sixth solaces attorney signed a letter agreement on behalf of mr salazar and sallust and co l c agreeing to arbitrate with judge steve scott here in washington the letter agreement specified that the ward would be certified by the western district of washington in this lawsuit both mr solace and solace in l c were represented by mr wade and both were specifically identified in that letter its exhibit r three zero four three zero six and they consented to washington jurisdiction the majority of federal courts have held that where a party has agreed to arbitrate in a particular forum only the district court in that forum has jurisdiction to confirm the award furthermore an agreement to arbitrate in his state amounts to a consent to jurisdiction in that state and we decided the case union mutual stock life insurance a first circuit case which relies upon moore's federal practice for that proposition so there mr salus and sallis and co in that letter and in the agreement consented to jurisdiction in washington and the only place then to confirm the award in that case is the district court for washington in any event the district court had specific personal jurisdiction over salus and his l c washington's long arm statute identifies three requirements sallust number ones mr sallust transacted business in washington state number two green fields claims arise out of that washington state transaction and number three jurisdiction over sallust does not offend traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice we've i think brief this case this issue thoroughly i want to just emphasize the contacts itself and then i'll move on sallis was the one who contacted greenfield initially secondly sallust signed contracts that specifically identified or specifically agreed to arbitration in washington and the application of washington law therefore he's relying on washington law to enforce the contract if greenfield breaches the initial two projects expanded ultimately into twenty one projects over an eighteen month period there were numerous phone calls e mails and other communications between greenfield employees and mr south us and it was mr salazar in every single instance there was no one else that communicated with greenfield or its employees ninety two percent of the work was done by greenfield a ploy employees in washington state checks were sent by mr sal to greenfield in washington and sallust made multiple promises to pay greenfield in some cases even out of his own funds now can counsel raise the question about proper service  sallis and co served daisy who is the secretary or office assistant to sell us and sallis is the head of the company and the registered agent for the company and the only person than other person in the company the only person in the company so under our c w four point two eight zero eight zero perenna nine that is satisfactory service on salus and co l c service on a secretary in the office of the agent and the court also found that it was proper service under section ten and section fifteen but there's no question it's service under section nine on solace co l see now then greenfield later personally served  mr sallust personally this is all prior to removal no that second service was after removal and that is the negative their argument is that we serve the old complaint and the old washington state summons on mr celis but the case had already been removed to federal district court and so the argument that he's making based on the beach or versus wallace case is that oh no you should have gone to district court and had them issue a stay a summons that said once there are u s district court on and had the new number but the case that he cites beecher versus wallace recites three different scenarios the first of which is where there are multiple defendants in a case one of the defendants is served by the state court action and the other one has no knowledge at all about the state court action and it makes sense that if there's a removeable and then later that other defendant is served and has no knowledge of the case that there might be a due process question and that's what the court framed as a due process question but beecher what wallace then recites to other scenarios where it would not apply and those are the scenarios that apply in this case because mr solace had actual notice of this federal court proceeding because he was the one  c and he stated in his declaration supporting the removal that he received notice on whatever the date was that daisy was served with notice so due process was met here he had notice and he was properly served he there's an argument about whether salis was personally bound by the award this is an arbitrator question this is a question that was submitted to the arbitrator and it is beyond the purview of this court i believe it except where under the f a a or washington statute regarding arbitration the arbitrator exceeded his authority and there's no claim of the thing about  will that sufficient to indicate that this question of whether the us is personally yes it is because the whole record is not available in fact the letter that he wrote is not appealable so the only record that this court is able to look at is the actual decision which does specifically identify both parties and it was also an issue that was fully argued and briefed at the arbitra level and some of the evidence that the arbitrator considered were the professional services agreement which identifies in the top left hand corner of the client is camille ok solace the mr solace signed each part there  multiple he signed each professional service agreement although he did know that he was the principal of sallust and co but then there were some twenty or so supplemental contracts letters that were all addressed to mr solace that he is signed personally these were all exhibits in the arbitration that the court considered what's this hypothetical question to fall  calculated at the federal rate and not the contradictory so there is a similarity between the two arguments between the interest and the attorneys fees issue and part of it does turn on whether the contract that washington law would apply versus whether federal law would apply and when our position is that if i know what your position is you well stated but if the panel were to conclude that the fee award should have been pursuant of the federal arbitration act does it not follow that interest elation should be made at the federal rate not the contractor well i think the disagree with that that was ok well as far as the attorney's fees issue is concerned there is a preemption by federal law generally speaking and the f a a but there is really no conflict between the a and state law the state law says gives the court the discretion to award attorneys fees and the f a a is simply silent on it it doesn't prohibit an award of attorney's fees and i understand the statute th common law is that in the absence of such a statute or contract there are no attorney's fees so i believe that there is no conflict but i have to go back to my argument about whether there was a clear intent to apply washington state law and i believe if you analyze these two choice of law clauses there are two of them and particularly the arbitration clause that it is clear that there was an intent to apply washington law and on that basis this court should affirm entirely the district court's decision thank you your honors thank you mr peterson mr wade you have paid one man is i don't think i'll need more than that i'll respond as briefly and directly as i can first of all i believe that counsel is mistaken the arbitration award did not identify any particular person going to snow as we asked we raised that issue time and time again and from the arbitrator in front of silly we never nobody ever gave us any rationale nobody ever said yeah you're you're both liable other than the fact that judge silly entered judgment against both the arbitrator did not  second counsel started by saying oh gee if you were to to dismiss this this case on jurisdictional grounds that the defendant would receive a windfall that's not true the remedy was that they should have filed this lawsuit in the proper jurisdiction to begin with they had several years to do that and they chose not to that was a risk that they chose to take and i don't know if the statue of limitations has run or