Rudolf Kronhofer v Marianne Maier and Others.
Date: 2004-06-10
12. It should be noted at the outset that the system of common rules of conferment of jurisdiction laid down in Title II of the Convention is based on the general rule, set out in the first paragraph of Article 2, that persons domiciled in a Contracting State are to be sued in the courts of that State, irrespective of the nationality of the parties.
13. It is only by way of derogation from that fundamental principle attributing jurisdiction to the courts of the defendant’s domicile that Section 2 of Title II of the Convention makes provision for certain special jurisdictional rules, such as that laid down in Article 5(3) of the Convention.
14. Those special jurisdictional rules must be restrictively interpreted and cannot give rise to an interpretation going beyond the cases expressly envisaged by the Convention (see Case 189/87 Kalfelis [1988] ECR 5565, paragraph 19, and Case C-433/01 Blijdenstein [2004] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 25).
15. According to settled case-law, the rule laid down in Article 5(3) of the Convention is based on the existence of a particularly close connecting factor between a dispute and courts other than those for the place where the defendant is domiciled, which justifies the attribution of jurisdiction to those courts for reasons relating to the sound administration of justice and the efficacious conduct of proceedings (see, inter alia, Case 21/76 Bier (‘ Mines de Potasse d’Alsace ’) [1976] ECR 1735, paragraph 11, and Case C-167/00 Henkel [2002] ECR I‑8111, paragraph 46).
16. The Court has also held that where the place in which the event which may give rise to liability in tort, delict or quasi-delict occurs and the place where that event results in damage are not identical, the expression ‘place where the harmful event occurred’ in Article 5(3) of the Convention must be understood as being 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 claimant, in the courts for either of those places (see, inter alia, Mines de potasse d’Alsace , paragraphs 24 and 25, and Case C-18/02 DFDS Torline [2004] ECR I-0000, paragraph 40).
19. As the Court has held, the term ‘place where the harmful event occurred’ cannot be construed so extensively as to encompass any place where the adverse consequences can be felt of an event which has already caused damage actually arising elsewhere (see Case C-364/93 Marinari [1995] ECR I-2719, paragraph 14).
20. In a situation such as that in the main proceedings, such an interpretation would mean that the determination of the court having jurisdiction would depend on matters that were uncertain, such as the place where the victim’s ‘assets are concentrated’ and would thus run counter to the strengthening of the legal protection of persons established in the Community which, by enabling the claimant to identify easily the court in which he may sue and the defendant reasonably to foresee in which court he may be sued, is one of the objectives of the Convention (see Case C-256/00 Besix [2002] ECR I-1699, paragraphs 25 and 26, and DFDS Torline, paragraph 36). Furthermore, it would be liable in most cases to give jurisdiction to the courts of the place in which the claimant was domiciled. As the Court found at paragraph 14 of this judgment, the Convention does not favour that solution except in cases where it expressly so provides.
21. In view of the foregoing considerations, the answer to the question referred must be that Article 5(3) of the Convention must be interpreted as meaning that the expression ‘place where the harmful event occurred’ does not refer to the place where the claimant is domiciled or where ‘his assets are concentrated’ by reason only of the fact that he has suffered financial damage there resulting from the loss of part of his assets which arose and was incurred in another Contracting State.