Nejvyšší soud České republiky; 2015-09-23; 25 Cdo 3273/2014
Decision by national courts in the field of European Union law — ECLI:CZ:NS:2015:25.CDO.3273.2014.1
Date: 2015-09-23
Subject matter: Judicial cooperation in civil matters
Origin: Czechia

82015CZ0923(51)_ENG_SUMJURE
JURE summary
JURE summary
A Czech citizen V.Š. (hereinafter “the plaintiff”) sued other Czech citizens J.W., A.J. and M.K. for damage compensation.
One of the sued persons (hereinafter “the defendant”) raised an objection of lack of jurisdiction of the Court of First instance, where the action was filed. The Court of First Instance discovered that the defendant is not domiciled within its territorial jurisdiction, as was wrongly stated in the action filed by the plaintiff, but is domiciled in Sweden instead. The court invoked Article 5(3) of the Brussels I Regulation (1), according to which “a person domiciled in a Member State may, in another Member State, be sued, in matters relating to tort, delict or quasi-delict, in the courts for the place where the harmful event occurred or may occurred”. Therefore, the court declared a lack of its jurisdiction and referred this case to the Okresní soud Kutná Hora (hereinafter “District Court Kutná Hora”), in the jurisdiction of which the most relevant linking factors (to the place where the harmful event occurred) was situated. This decision was appealed by the defendant.
The Court of Appeal confirmed all factual and legal findings of the Court of First Instance and added that the plaintiff had a possibility of opting for Swedish court or the District Court Kutná Hora and, therefore, the Court of First Instance correctly referred the case to that court.
The plaintiff filed a cassation appeal to the Nejvyšší soud (hereinafter “the Supreme Court”). The plaintiff alleged that the defendant had dual citizenship (Swedish and Czech) and at the time of filing the action he had permanent residence within the territorial jurisdiction of the Court of First Instance. The plaintiff alleged that the Brussels I Regulation should not be applied to disputes between Czech citizens in proceedings before Czech courts. Therefore, the Czech legislation and last known residence of the defendant should be used for the determination of jurisdiction.
According to the Supreme Court, the factual domicile is one of the reasons to regard the proceedings as one with an international aspect. The factual domicile of the defendant is in Sweden, which must be regarded as the international aspect allowing application of the European Union law, which prefers to the domicile rather than citizenship as the key element for establishing jurisdiction. This could be supported by the wording of the general principle set in Article 2(1) of the Brussels I Regulation. Furthermore, the Supreme Court pointed out on the European case-law, according to which “the fact remains that the expression “place where the harmful event occurred or may occur’ in Article 5(3) of Brussels I Regulation is intended to cover both the place where the damage occurred and the place of the event giving rise to it, so that the defendant may be sued, at the option of the applicant, in the courts for either of those places” (2). Moreover, only the court in the jurisdiction of which the relevant linking factor is situated may validly be seised. The Court of Appeal was correct to apply the Brussels I Regulation and to state that the most relevant linking factor to the case has the District Court Kutná Hora.
The Supreme Court confirmed the decision of the Court of Appeal and rejected the cassation appeal.
(1) Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.(2) Judgment of the Court of Justice of 5 June 2014, Coty Germany GmbH vs. First Note Perfumes NV, C-360/12, ECLI:EU:C:2014:1318, paragraph 46.