Opinion ID: 2675191
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Imputation and Due Process

Text: While Florida law contemplates the imputation of jurisdictional contacts between an agent and its principal, authority is split over whether imputation on the basis of an agency relationship comports with Federal Due Process. In Daimler AG v. Bauman, the Supreme Court was presented with the question of whether a principal can be subject to general jurisdiction based on its agent’s contacts with the forum state. 134 S. Ct. 746 (2014). The court recognized: 9 Case: 12-31213 Document: 00512636188 Page: 10 Date Filed: 05/20/2014 No. 12-31213 “Daimler argues, and several Courts of Appeals have held, that a subsidiary’s jurisdictional contacts can be imputed to its parent only when the former is so dominated by the latter as to be its alter ego.” The court, however, then decided “we need not pass judgment on invocation of an agency theory in the context of general jurisdiction, for in no event can the appeals court’s analysis be sustained.” Daimler, 134 S. Ct. at 759. As for agency imputation in specific jurisdiction cases, the Court noted: Agency relationships, we have recognized, may be relevant to the existence of specific jurisdiction. . . . As such, a corporation can purposefully avail itself of a forum by directing its agents or distributors to take action there. . . . It does not inevitably follow, however, that similar reasoning applies to general jurisdiction. Id. at 759 n.13 (emphasis added). Daimler therefore embraces the significance of a principal-agent relationship to the specific-jurisdiction analysis, though it suggests that an agency relationship alone may not be dispositive. See id. at 759 (“Agencies . . . come in many sizes and shapes . . . [a] subsidiary, for example, might be its parent’s agent for claims arising in the place where the subsidiary operates, yet not its agent regarding claims arising elsewhere.”). 7 7 Even accepting that the principles of imputation translate to specific-jurisdiction analysis, there are material differences between the Ninth Circuit’s agency test and Florida’s (and the Eleventh Circuit’s) agency test that mitigate concerns about imputation in this case. Daimler described the Ninth Circuit’s test as “a less rigorous test” than alter-ego inquiries focusing on the parent’s domination of the subsidiary. Daimler, 134 S. Ct. at 759. The Ninth Circuit’s agency analysis “is satisfied by a showing that the subsidiary functions as the parent corporation’s representative in that it performs services that are sufficiently important to the foreign corporation that if it did not have a representative to perform them, the corporation’s own officials would undertake to perform substantially similar services.” Bauman v. DaimlerChrysler Corp., 644 F.3d 909, 920 (9th Cir. 2011), rev’d sub nom. Daimler AG v. Bauman, 134 S. Ct. 746 (2014). An alter-ego finding in the Ninth Circuit, however, “is predicated upon a showing of parental control over the subsidiary.” Id. As discussed, unlike the agency test in the Ninth Circuit, under Florida law an agency relationship is predicated on the parent’s control of the subsidiary: “[T]he parent corporation, to be liable for its subsidiary’s acts under the . . . agency theory, must exercise control to the extent the subsidiary manifests no separate corporate interests of its own and functions solely to achieve the purposes of the dominant corporation.” Enic, 870 So. 2d at 891. This control-focused inquiry overlaps with the alter-ego test adopted by most circuits. See Daimler, 134 S. Ct. at 10 Case: 12-31213 Document: 00512636188 Page: 11 Date Filed: 05/20/2014 No. 12-31213 Daimler’s illustrative example of when the principal-agent relationship informs the specific-jurisdiction analysis of related entities is present here. The agency relationship between TG and TTP reflects TG’s purposeful availment of the Florida forum. See Daimler, 134 S. Ct. at 759 n.13. The record, as set forth by the district court, and assessed below, demonstrates that TG’s parental control over its agent, TTP, pervaded TTP’s dealings with the forum, and therefore allows TTP’s contacts with Florida to be imputed to TG for the purpose of specific jurisdiction. See, e.g., Pesaplastic, C.A. v. Cincinnati Milacron Co., 750 F.2d 1516, 1521–23 (11th Cir. 1985) (upholding finding of specific jurisdiction based on agency relationship); John Scott, Inc. v. Munford, Inc., 670 F. Supp. 344, 347 (S.D. Fla. 1987) (assessing specific jurisdiction, and holding that “the contacts of ASIAN ARTS’s agent MUNFORD, whose agency relationship has been established by prima facie evidence, may be attributed to ASIAN ARTS for the purposes of satisfying due process.”).