Opinion ID: 804190
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: General Jurisdiction Over Mr. Friedland

Text: The district court held that it did not have general jurisdiction over Mr. Friedland. It noted that “Plaintiffs only allege that this Court has general jurisdiction over Defendant Friedland because he has been a litigant in the Colorado courts numerous times in the past in relation to the clean up for the Summitville Mine Site,” and found that “there is no legal authority supporting the notion that this should be sufficient to sustain general jurisdiction over [Mr.] Friedland. Rather . . . the pursuit of the litigation in Colorado does not constitute ‘continuous and systematic general business contacts’ with Colorado.” Grynberg, 666 F. Supp. 2d at 1230–31 (quoting OMI Holdings, Inc. v. Royal Ins. Co. of Can., 149 F.3d 1086, 1091 (10th Cir. 1998)). Further, the district court explained that “[Mr.] Friedland’s litigation in Colorado all surrounded a single issue, i.e., -12- the clean up costs for the Mine,” and it declined to hold that “litigation related to a single separate issue is sufficient to confer general jurisdiction on a defendant for any and all future lawsuits in a forum state.” Id. at 1231. The plaintiffs argue that there were continuous and systematic general business contacts between Mr. Friedland and Colorado because he “(1) conducted continuous mining operations in Colorado for at least eight years; (2) asserted claims against the State of Colorado; (3) entered into a consent decree . . . ; and (4) systematically and repeatedly used the courts of Colorado for his benefit.” Aplt. Opening Br. at 27. However, the plaintiffs have waived any argument that general jurisdiction may be exercised over Mr. Friedland based on his operation of the mine, as opposed to his associated litigation conduct. In response to the defendants’ motion to dismiss, the plaintiffs argued that “[Mr.] Friendland’s [sic] contacts with Colorado began in 1996 . . . [when] Friedland sued and was sued by the State of Colorado . . . for reimbursement of cleanup costs of the Summitville Mine Site.” Aplt. App. at 130–31 (Pls.’ Resp. to Defs.’ Am. Mot. to Dismiss for Lack of Personal Jurisdiction, filed Feb. 6, 2009). Accordingly, the district court explicitly noted that “Plaintiffs do not assert that [Mr.] Friedland is subject to general jurisdiction in Colorado based on his involvement with the Mine, rather they assert only that he is subject to general -13- jurisdiction for the subsequent Mine Litigation and recovery actions.” 5 Grynberg, 666 F. Supp. 2d at 1231 n.5. The plaintiffs have not argued for application of the plain-error standard before us and, therefore, they can advance no further on their jurisdictional arguments regarding Mr. Friedland’s mining-operation conduct. See, e.g., Richison v. Ernest Grp., Inc., 634 F.3d 1123, 1131 (10th Cir. 2011) (“[T]he failure to argue for plain error and its application on appeal[ ]surely marks the end of the road for an argument for reversal not first presented to the district court.”). In other words, such arguments are waived. If the plaintiffs are to establish general jurisdiction over Mr. Friedland, they must do so based only on his litigation conduct. “Because general jurisdiction is not related to the events giving rise to the suit, courts impose a more stringent minimum contacts test, requiring the plaintiff 5 The defendants correctly note that the plaintiffs “first made reference to [Mr.] Friedland’s non-litigation involvement with the Summitville Mine in their surreply below.” Aplee. Br. at 38 n.21 (emphasis omitted). Specifically, in their surreply, the plaintiffs stated that “[Mr.] Friedland’s activities in Colorado stretch[] from his pollution of the Summitville area of Colorado,” Aplt. App. at 709 (Pls.’ Surreply to Defs.’ Reply to Pls.’ Resp. to Defs.’ Am. Mot. to Dismiss, filed Mar. 19, 2009), and that “his contacts with Colorado began with his disastrous pollution of the Summitville mine area 20 years ago,” id. at 711. The district court was not obliged to consider such late-blooming contentions. See, e.g., Stump v. Gates, 211 F.3d 527, 533 (10th Cir. 2000) (“This court does not ordinarily review issues raised for the first time in a reply brief.”); see also Venuto v. Carella, Byrne, Bain, Gilfillan, Cecchi & Stewart, P.C., 11 F.3d 385, 388 (3d Cir. 1993) (“The district court properly exercised its discretion and refused to consider contentions first addressed in the sur reply memorandum.”). -14- to demonstrate the defendant’s continuous and systematic general business contacts.” Benton v. Cameco Corp., 375 F.3d 1070, 1080 (10th Cir. 2004) (quoting OMI Holdings, 149 F.3d at 1091) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A. v. Brown, 131 S. Ct. 2846, 2855 (2011) (“[T]ies serving to bolster the exercise of specific jurisdiction do not warrant a determination that, based on those ties, the forum has general jurisdiction over a defendant.”); Marcus Food, 671 F.3d at 1167; Shrader, 633 F.3d at 1243; see also Doe v. Nat’l Med. Servs., 974 F.2d 143, 146 (10th Cir. 1992) (“[D]efendant’s contacts with the state must be greater than those required for specific jurisdiction.”). This is a “high burden.” Benton, 735 F.3d at 1081; see Trierweiler v. Croxton & Trench Holding Corp., 90 F.3d 1523, 1543 (10th Cir. 1996) (“high threshold”); see also 4 Charles Allen Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice & Procedure § 1067.5, at 520 (3d ed. 2002) (opining that the Supreme Court’s decision in Helicopteros “suggests very strongly that the threshold contacts required for a constitutional assertion of general jurisdiction over a nonresident defendant are very substantial, indeed”); accord Tamburo v. Dworkin, 601 F.3d 693, 701 (7th Cir. 2010). To establish general jurisdiction, “the commercial contacts here must be of a sort ‘that approximate physical presence’ in the state.” Shrader, 633 F.3d at 1243 (quoting Bancroft & Masters, Inc. v. Augusta Nat’l, Inc., 223 F.3d 1082, 1086 (9th Cir. 2000)); see Goodyear Dunlop Tires -15- Operations, S.A., 131 S. Ct. at 2853–54 (“For an individual, the paradigm forum for the exercise of general jurisdiction is the individual’s domicile; for a corporation, it is an equivalent place, one in which the corporation is fairly regarded as at home.”). We have established four factors to consider in deciding whether general jurisdiction has been established: (1) whether the corporation solicits business in the state through a local office or agents; (2) whether the corporation sends agents into the state on a regular basis to solicit business; (3) the extent to which the corporation holds itself out as doing business in the forum state, through advertisements, listings or bank accounts; and (4) the volume of business conducted in the state by the corporation. Kuenzle v. HTM Sport-Und Freizeitgeräte AG, 102 F.3d 453, 457 (10th Cir. 1996) (quoting Trierweiler, 90 F.3d at 1533) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Doering v. Copper Mountain, Inc., 259 F.3d 1202, 1210 (10th Cir. 2001). Mr. Friedland’s contacts with Colorado—all of which arise out of litigation over the Summitville Mine cleanup—satisfy none of these criteria. First, as an indication of the “high burden” necessary to invoke general jurisdiction, Benton, 735 F.3d at 1081, we note that the Supreme Court has found such jurisdiction to exist just once, see Perkins v. Benguet Consol. Mining Co., 342 U.S. 437 (1952). In Perkins, the Supreme Court permitted the exercise of general jurisdiction over a corporation whose president, general manager, and principal stockholder “carried on in Ohio a continuous and systematic supervision -16- of the necessarily limited wartime activities of the company.” 324 U.S. at 448. As subsequent Supreme Court decisions have emphasized, the company president kept company files, held directors’ meetings, carried on business correspondence, distributed paychecks, and supervised policies regarding rehabilitation of the company’s Philippines properties from Ohio. See Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A., 131 S. Ct. at 2856–57; Helicopteros Nacionales de Colombia, S.A., 466 U.S. at 415; Keeton v. Hustler Magazine, Inc., 465 U.S. 770, 779 n.11 (1984); see also Perkins, 342 U.S. at 448. The contrast between the contacts permitting general jurisdiction in Perkins and Mr. Friedland’s Colorado contacts is striking. The plaintiffs’ allegations in support of general jurisdiction contain none of the activities emphasized by the Supreme Court. Instead, the plaintiffs rely on a “pattern of litigation, which involved the commencement of at least four lawsuits in federal and state courts in Colorado,” Aplt. Opening Br. at 26, which the plaintiffs seek to “liken[] more to an ongoing and integrated business plan than a mere chance encounter with the Colorado courts,” id. at 29. As the district court correctly noted, however, “Friedland’s litigation in Colorado all surrounded a single issue, i.e., the clean up costs for the Mine.” Grynberg, 666 F. Supp. 2d at 1231. Indeed, the limited case law on whether general jurisdiction can be based on litigation contacts supports our conclusion that plaintiffs have failed to establish general jurisdiction over Mr. Friedland. Most persuasive is Soma -17- Medical International v. Standard Chartered Bank, in which this court held that “fil[ing] five civil cases in Utah prior to 1992 to recover monies and/or foreclose on trust deeds” were not “the kind of ‘substantial and continuous local activity’ necessary to subject [a defendant] to general jurisdiction.” 196 F.3d 1292, 1296 (10th Cir. 1999) (quoting Arguello v. Woodworking Mach. Co., 838 P.2d 1120, 1122 (Utah 1992)). Similarly, in United States v. Swiss American Bank, Ltd., the First Circuit applied federal law and found general jurisdiction lacking where, among other contacts, “in 1990, [defendant] was an appellant in a lawsuit in a [forum] court,” but “ha[d] no office, personnel, or telephone number in the [forum].” 274 F.3d 610, 619–21 (1st Cir. 2001). Following the reasoning of Soma Medical and Swiss American Bank, it cannot be said that Mr. Friedland’s “general business” is mine-cleanup litigation; indeed, the plaintiffs allege that he is the “Executive Co-Chairman of Ivanhoe Energy Inc. and Executive Chairman of Ivanhoe Latin and Ivanhoe Ecuador.” Aplt. App. at 338. In other words, his domestic litigation detours into Colorado do not amount to “continuous and systematic general business contacts” sufficient for the exercise of general jurisdiction. Benton, 375 F.3d at 1080 (quoting OMI Holdings, 149 F.3d at 1091) (internal quotation marks omitted). Accordingly, we hold that the plaintiffs have failed to satisfy their burden to establish general jurisdiction over Mr. Friedland.