Opinion ID: 202226
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Application of the Warsaw Convention

Text: 13 Echoing the district court, Iberia notes that since [t]he Warsaw Convention's dispositions provide the exclusive source of an airline's liability in international flights claims, Acevedo-Reinoso's claim falls short because he does not allege any physical injury or an accident. Acevedo-Reinoso, on the other hand, argues that the court erroneously assumed the Convention's applicability without resolving the threshold issue of whether his injuries were sustained . . . on board the aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking. 8 Convention art. 17. According to Acevedo-Reinoso, the Convention does not apply—and his Puerto Rico tort claim is therefore not preempted—because he was not embarking or disembarking when he sustained his injuries. Rather, Acevedo-Reinoso argues, his injuries were sustained in Spain in a detention jail and [in] ... being deported back to Puerto Rico in front of all the members of the Association. 14 We agree with Acevedo-Reinoso that the district court erroneously conflated the applicability of the Convention with liability under the Convention. The Convention's applicability rests on a determination of whether the passenger's injury occurred on board the aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking. Convention art. 17. If the Convention applies in a particular case, it is preemptive, and the trier of fact must then determine whether the carrier is liable under the Convention. See El Al Israel, 525 U.S. at 161, 119 S.Ct. 662 ([R]ecovery for a personal injury on board [an] aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking, if not allowed under the Convention, is not available at all.) (internal citation and quotation marks omitted); see id. at 174, 119 S.Ct. 662 ([I]n all questions relating to the carrier's liability, it is the provisions of the [C]onvention which apply and [] the passenger does not have access to any other remedies, whether under the common law or otherwise, which may be available within the particular country where he chooses to raise his action. (quoting Sidhu v. British Airways plc, [1997] 1 All E. R., 193 at 201, 207)). If the Convention is not applicable, it is not preemptive, and the passenger is free to pursue his or her claim under local law. Id. at 171-72, 119 S.Ct. 662 ([T]he Convention addresses and concerns, only and exclusively, the airline's liability for passenger injuries occurring `on board the aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking.' (quoting Convention art. 17)). 15 Here, the district court assumed the applicability of the Convention, stating that pursuant to El Al Israel, plaintiffs' only basis of redress is the Convention's passenger liability provision. But El Al Israel does not support such an assumption. In that case, applicability of the Convention was not at issue because the parties explicitly agreed that the episode-in-suit occurred in international transportation in the course of embarking. El Al Israel, 525 U.S. at 167, 119 S.Ct. 662. In this case, by contrast, the parties dispute whether Acevedo-Reinoso's damages were sustained in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking, and, thus, whether the Convention is applicable. 16 Acevedo-Reinoso argues that Iberia's failure to advise him at the ticket counter of the need for a visa to enter Spain preceded his boarding the plane, and that his subsequent arrest upon arrival in Spain came well after he disembarked from the plane. Iberia, on the other hand, contends that its alleged failure to warn Acevedo-Reinoso at the airport in Puerto Rico and his ensuing arrest in Spain took place during the process of embarking and disembarking, respectively. Because the district court did not address this dispute, there was never any determination that the Convention was applicable and therefore preemptive of Acevedo-Reinoso's claim. See Marotte, 296 F.3d at 1260-61 (holding that the Convention preempted plaintiffs' state law claims where plaintiffs' injuries occurred in the process of embarking, as contemplated by the Warsaw Convention); see also McCarthy, 56 F.3d at 317 (holding that plaintiff was not engaged in the course of embarking under the Convention, based on (1) the passenger's activity at the time of injury, (2) his or her whereabouts when injured, and (3) the extent to which the carrier was exercising control at the moment of injury). The district court therefore erred in dismissing Acevedo-Reinoso's claim under the Convention without first determining whether Acevedo-Reinoso's injury occurred on board the airplane or in the process of embarking or disembarking.