PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

_____________

No. 11-1078

_____________

OTOS TECH CO., LTD.

v.

OGK AMERICA, INC.; YALE KIM, a/k/a Youngil Kim

v.

OTOS OPTICAL CO., LTD; MOON YOUNG HUH

 Otos Tech Co., Ltd.; Otos Optical Co., Ltd.; Moon 

Young Huh, 

 

 Appellants

_____________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of New Jersey

(Civ. No. 2:03-01979)

District Judge: Hon. William H. Walls

Submitted Under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)

June 24, 2011

Before: CHAGARES, JORDAN, and GREENAWAY, JR., 

Circuit Judges.
2

(Filed: August 9, 2011)

____________

OPINION

____________

CHAGARES, Circuit Judge.

Otos Tech. Co., Ltd., Otos Optical Co., Ltd., and 

Moon Young Huh (collectively, “Otos”) appeal the District 

Court’s denial of their request to enforce a judgment of the 

Supreme Court of South Korea against OGK America, Inc. 

and Yale Kim (collectively, “Kim”). For the reasons that 

follow, we will affirm. 

I.

This appeal involves two parallel litigations: one in 

the United States, before the United States District Court for 

the District of New Jersey, and one in South Korea. Otos 

originally brought suit in the District of New Jersey in 2003, 

asserting claims for breach of contract, conversion, and 

embezzlement. These claims arose out of Kim’s retention of 

three checks worth $587,775.05. Kim answered and asserted 

counterclaims for breach of contract, breach of a settlement 

agreement, and breach of the covenant of good faith and fair 

dealing. Kim maintained that Otos wrongfully terminated his 

employment contract and that he retained the three checks 

pursuant to an agreement between the two parties to settle this 

wrongful termination. 
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While this lawsuit was still pending, Otos brought an 

action against Kim in South Korea and asserted essentially 

identical claims pertaining to the same three checks. On 

December 16, 2005, a South Korean court entered judgment 

in favor of Otos in the amount of 607,156,665 South Korean 

Won, which was later reduced on appeal to 544,920,318 

South Korean Won, an amount that was equivalent to 

$587,755.05 (in U.S. dollars) at the time. Otos was also 

awarded post-judgment interest on that amount. Kim 

appealed the decision but the Supreme Court of Korea 

affirmed on December 24, 2008. 

Meanwhile, the litigation between Otos and Kim in the 

District of New Jersey proceeded to a trial before a jury. On 

August 11, 2006, after the conclusion of the trial, judgment 

was entered in favor of Otos in the amount of $587,755.05 on 

Otos’s conversion claim and in favor of Kim in the amount of 

$910,000 on Kim’s counterclaim for breach of the covenant 

of good faith and fair dealing. The District Court denied 

Otos’s motion for a new trial, and both parties appealed. This 

Court affirmed and remanded to the District Court for the 

calculation of post-judgment interest. Otos Tech Co. v. OGK 

Am., Inc., 295 F. App’x 514 (3d Cir. 2008). 

After the conclusion of the trial, Otos embarked on a 

campaign to seize Kim’s assets in Korea in order to satisfy 

the Korean judgment. Based on the record before this Court, 

Otos appears to have been successful in this endeavor. Kim 

ultimately paid 807,619,134 in South Korean Won between 

November 2006 and February 2009 to satisfy the Korean 

judgment, an amount that includes forced sales of Kim’s 

apartment and stocks as well as voluntary deposits made by 

Kim. In an order dated February 16, 2009, the South Korean 
4

court rejected Otos’s latest application to seize Kim’s assets, 

stating that “[i]t is clear that . . . the payment of the principal 

and interest on late payment . . . was fully carried out.” Joint 

Appendix (“JA”) 178 (emphasis added). Otos does not 

challenge this conclusion on appeal. 

Back in the United States, Kim filed a motion on 

December 22, 2008 requesting that the District Court order 

the turnover of funds from the accounts of one of Otos’s 

customers in light of Otos’s failure to pay Kim any money in 

satisfaction of the $910,000 judgment (plus interest) entered 

in Kim’s favor on August 11, 2006. Otos objected, and also 

argued that any turnover should be subject to a “setoff” in the 

amount of its American judgment, $587,755.05. The District 

Court granted Kim’s motion on July 29, 2009 and denied 

Otos’s request for a setoff, holding that “[i]f that judgment is 

set-off against [Kim’s] judgment here, a double recovery for 

[Otos] may result since [Otos] could also recover the Korean 

judgment entirely.” JA 96. 

Otos appealed, and we affirmed. Otos Tech Co. v. 

OGK Am., Inc., 393 F. App’x 5 (3d Cir. 2010). We held 

“that the District Court was within its discretion to deny Otos 

a setoff based on the possibility of a double recovery” given 

that “it has not been established on the record when, where, to 

whom, or in what amount the payments on the Korean 

judgment have been made.” Id. at 10 & n.6. In other words, 

it was unclear at the time whether granting Otos a setoff on its 

American judgment may result in Otos impermissibly 

recovering twice for the same harm: once in satisfaction of 

its Korean judgment, and again by reducing Kim’s American 

judgment. In light of the vagaries of the record, we 

concluded by noting that, on remand, the District Court may 
5

“test[] the merits of the parties’ claims in order to avoid a 

double recovery” by various means, depending on whether 

Otos filed a motion to enforce the Korean judgment, Kim 

filed a motion to declare Otos’s American judgment satisfied, 

“or by some other means.” Id. at 10 n.6.

Otos elected to proceed by seeking to enforce the 

Korean judgment. On September 16, 2010, Otos filed a 

motion before the District Court seeking to satisfy the Korean 

judgment and to “equalize” the Korean judgment with the 

American judgment. Although Otos did not dispute that Kim 

had satisfied the Korean judgment, Otos asserted that due to a 

devaluation of the South Korean Won, Kim’s satisfaction of 

the Korean judgment only amounted to an actual payment of 

$382,215 (in U.S. dollars). As a result, Otos maintained that 

the Korean judgment should be “equalized” with the 

American judgment in the amount of $205,540.05, the 

difference between the amount of the American judgment 

($587,755.05) and the actual payments made by Kim after 

being adjusted by currency devaluation ($382,215). 

On December 16, 2010, the District Court denied 

Otos’s motion, concluding that although the Korean judgment 

was both valid and enforceable in American courts, it “has 

been fully satisfied.” JA 26. This timely appeal followed.

II.

This is a diversity action governed by New Jersey law. 

The District Court had jurisdiction over this action pursuant 

to 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a)(2) and we have jurisdiction under 28 

U.S.C. § 1291. 
6

We exercise de novo review over a district court’s 

decision to grant full faith and credit to a foreign judgment. 

See Barrows v. Barrows, 489 F.2d 661, 662-63 (3d Cir. 1974) 

(conducting a de novo review in determining the 

enforceability of a foreign judgment); see also Diorinou v. 

Mezitis, 237 F.3d 133, 139 (2d Cir. 2001) (collecting cases

and noting that “domestic courts have not clearly articulated 

the standard of appellate review of the decision whether to 

enforce [a] foreign judgment, but appear to be applying a de

novo standard”). 

III.

As an initial matter, we agree with the District Court’s 

conclusion that the Korean judgment is both valid and 

enforceable in American courts. “The Treaty of Friendship, 

Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of 

America and The Republic of Korea elevates a Korean 

judgment to the status of a sister state judgment,” and “[i]n 

New Jersey, sister state judgments by confession are entitled 

to full faith and credit.” Choi v. Kim, 50 F.3d 244, 248 (3d 

Cir. 1995) (citation omitted). None of the various exceptions 

to the enforcement of such sister state judgments – such as 

lack of personal or subject matter jurisdiction, or the failure to 

provide adequate due process – are applicable to this case. 

See id.

Notwithstanding this initial conclusion, we will affirm 

the District Court’s denial of Otos’s motion to enforce the 

Korean judgment. Put simply, Otos is attempting to enforce 

the wrong judgment in this case. In our previous opinion in 

this matter, we noted that the record was then unclear whether 

Kim had satisfied the Korean judgment, and that accordingly, 
7

a setoff was inappropriate in light of the risk that Otos may 

impermissibly recover twice for the same harm: once in 

Korea, and then again by reducing Kim’s award by the value 

of Otos’s American judgment. Otos Tech, 393 F. App’x at 10 

& n.6. 

The record now appears to be clear that Kim has 

satisfied the Korean judgment. A Korean court has explicitly 

held as much and Otos has not contested this fact below or on 

appeal. As such, there is no merit in Otos’s attempt to satisfy 

the Korean judgment for a second time in the District of New 

Jersey. There is also no support for Otos’s novel proposition 

that a previously satisfied foreign judgment is subject to some 

kind of “equalization” in American courts in light of currency 

devaluation. We therefore agree with the District Court’s 

conclusion that the judgment in this case “has been fully 

satisfied.” JA 26.

IV.

For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm.