Opinion ID: 15886
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: American Kitchen & Bath

Text: 13 Under the Texas Long Arm Statute, Leedo had to provide the Secretary of State the home office address of AKB. AKB maintains that its home office is located at 2211 North Elston, Chicago, Illinois, and that Leedo was aware of this address due to prior dealings between Leedo's representatives and Lange. However, Leedo provided the Texas Secretary of State with one of AKB's satellite retail locations address at Sibley Blvd., Posen, Illinois. Leedo chose this address because AKB listed the Sibley Blvd-Posen address with the Illinois Secretary of State as the correct address for service of process. Additionally, the sales agreement between Leedo and James Sales and AKB had the Sibley Blvd-Posen address. See Plaintiff's Original Petition, Exhibit A. Regarding service on AKB, the Texas Secretary of State's certificate reflected that the certified mail return receipt bore the signature of Addressee's Agent at the Sibley Blvd-Posen address. 14 The Texas Long Arm Statute provides no definition for home or home office. See Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem.Code §§ 17.044, 17.045 (Vernon 1997). See also Mahon v. Caldwell, Haddad, Skaggs, Inc., 783 S.W.2d 769 (Tex.App.-Fort Worth 1990, no writ). Although no Texas case addresses the precise issue before the court, Mahon 1 offers some guidance. In Mahon, the court held inter alia that where only one address is given in a contract as the business address it is the 'home office' of the party using such address. Id. at 771. The actual address of the home office was much clearer in Mahon as that address was the only address to appear in all documents in the record. In this case, the Sibley Blvd-Posen address appears in the sales contract, the Harvey, Illinois address appears in various invoices throughout the record as the cabinets were shipped to that address, and two Leedo representatives met Lange at the actual home office (the North Elston-Chicago address). Nonetheless, the Mahon court singled out the only address given in the contract as being the home office for purposes of the Long Arm Statute. 15 In this case, we need not rely solely on the argument that the Sibley Blvd-Posen address was the only address to appear in the sales agreement, because it also was the address provided by AKB to the Illinois Secretary of State as the correct address for service of process. We conclude that Leedo provided AKB's home office address for purposes of the Long Arm Statute. Even if the Sibley Blvd-Posen address was not in fact the home office of AKB, AKB held out the Sibley Blvd-Posen address as its home office by registering that address with the Illinois Secretary of State and by placing it as the only address in the sales agreement. We find it disingenuous for AKB to argue otherwise. The objective of the Texas Long Arm Statute is to provide reasonable notice of the suit and an opportunity to be heard. See Barnes v. Frost National Bank, 840 S.W.2d 747, 750 (Tex.App.--San Antonio 1992, no writ). That objective has been satisfied. 16 Alternatively, AKB argues that this court should set aside the default judgment under Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b) for good cause. See CJC Holdings, Inc. v. Wright & Lato, Inc., 979 F.2d 60 (5th Cir.1992). AKB maintains that good cause exists because it did not expect that Leedo had a viable claim against it and upon receipt of the Original Petition, Lange could have been confused as to which company was alleged to be liable on the debt for cabinets in the possession of James Sales. We fail to see how this establishes good cause. Finally, AKB argues that it has a meritorious defense because the documents appended to the Original Petition fall short of even raising an inference that a debt was owed to Leedo by AKB. We disagree. AKB signed the Security Agreement. Further, AKB failed to cite any authority on appeal or below to support the argument that it had a meritorious defense. We find that the district court did not abuse its discretion. 17 Accordingly, the denial of the motion to set aside default judgment against AKB is affirmed.