Opinion ID: 701724
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Law Governing Standing to Sue

Text: 13 The novel legal question presented in this case is not whether standing must be determined by reference to the laws of the Convention's contracting states, KAL I, 932 F.2d at 1485, but what that law is in this particular context. KAL argues that the question of Mr. Alcabasa's standing is controlled by the Death on the High Seas Act (DOHSA), which provides in pertinent part: 14 Whenever the death of a person shall be caused by wrongful act, neglect, or default occurring on the high seas beyond a marine league from the shore of any State ... the personal representative of the decedent may maintain a suit for damages in the district courts of the United States.... 15 46 U.S.C.App. Sec. 761 (1988). 16 In Offshore Logistics, Inc. v. Tallentire, 477 U.S. 207, 106 S.Ct. 2485, 91 L.Ed.2d 174 (1986), the Supreme Court eliminated any doubt that DOHSA is applicable to accidents involving aircraft as well as ships by applying it to a helicopter crash 35 miles off the Louisiana coast. Id. at 218, 106 S.Ct. at 2492. DOHSA applied, the Court reasoned, because the helicopter was engaged in a function traditionally performed by waterborne vessels: the ferrying of passengers from an island ... to the shore. Id. at 219, 106 S.Ct. at 2492. The Court also determined that the statute preempts State law where it applies. Id. at 232, 106 S.Ct. at 2499. Because KAL flight 007's function--ferrying passengers across the Pacific Ocean--was also one traditionally performed by waterborne vessels and because Mr. Alcabasa does not claim that the wrongful act that caused Ms. Bayona's death did not occur on the high seas, we find that DOHSA is the applicable law of the United States in this case. Under DOHSA, only the personal representative of the deceased may bring suit for wrongful death, see, e.g., Futch v. Midland Enters., Inc., 471 F.2d 1195, 1196 (5th Cir.1973); 2 Benedict on Admiralty Sec. 83(a)(1) (7th ed. 1995); and a personal representative is by definition a court-appointed executor or administrator of an estate, not merely an heir. Briggs v. Walker, 171 U.S. 466, 471, 19 S.Ct. 1, 3, 43 L.Ed. 243 (1898). Thus, Mr. Alcabasa's attempt to sue must fail. 17 Although the district court correctly concluded that standing under the Warsaw Convention is determined in accordance with local law, it erred by assuming the relevant local law is the law of the District of Columbia. Memorandum Opinion at 5. When courts, including this one, determine that an international treaty leaves a certain policy determination to contracting states, they refer to the laws of the nations that are signatories to the agreement, not the political subdivisions thereof. See In re Mexico City, 708 F.2d at 415 (questions of who are the persons entitled to assert [a] cause of action [under the Warsaw Convention] may be determined by reference to ... federal statutes). In many instances, of course, there is no single law of the United States; and the structure of our federal system requires reference to the laws of the various States to determine the relevant national law. Here, however, we are dealing with a federal statute, DOHSA, that preempts state law. 18 We are aware that, in Zicherman, the Second Circuit rejected KAL's similar argument that it should look to DOHSA to determine what types of damage claims are cognizable under the Warsaw Convention. 43 F.3d at 21. Instead, it referred to federal common law general maritime principles, which, in that case, yielded a different result than DOHSA would have. Id. at 21-22. The court found that it could not reconcile DOHSA's limitation of damages to pecuniary loss with the 'aim of the [Warsaw] Convention's drafters and signatories ... to provide full compensatory damages for any injuries or death covered by the Convention....'  Id. at 22 (quoting In re Air Disaster at Lockerbie Scotland on Dec. 21, 1988, 37 F.3d 804, 829 (2d Cir.1994)). Whatever the merits of the Second Circuit's analysis of damages under the Convention, we are concerned here with the issue of standing, which Article 24 commits to the laws of the signatory states. In light of the Supreme Court's holding, in Offshore Logistics, that DOHSA governs tort claims arising out of accidents on the high seas, we must determine standing in accordance with its provisions. 19 Rather than argue that DOHSA does not apply to this case, Mr. Alcabasa asks that we ignore DOHSA and instead fashion a common law rule that would permit his suit. To do so would be equitable, he believes, because permitting only personal representatives to sue would subject the rights of the bereaved to the vagaries of state probate law and encourage races to the probate court. The problems embodied in such a rule are illustrated, in his opinion, by the facts of this case: Mr. Alcabasa alleges that Mr. Bayona secured his appointment as his sister's personal representative by fraudulently denying Mr. Alcabasa's existence to the New Jersey probate court. 20 Mr. Alcabasa's plea seems to assume that because the Warsaw Convention does not specify who has standing to sue, there is no governing law and, therefore, we have the discretion to create it as we see fit. He concedes that we might look to DOHSA for guidance, but believes we need not. This position reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the text of the Warsaw Convention and of our role as interpreters of the law. Under Article 24(2) of the Warsaw Convention, it is the contracting states [who] decide the standing ... of claimants.... KAL I, 932 F.2d at 1485 (emphasis added). The relevant contracting state in this case is the United States. 21 In discerning the underlying legal rule, we are bound by the applicable pronouncements of Congress. It is true that courts are often called upon to fashion common law rules to supplement maritime statutes because Congress has never enacted a comprehensive body of maritime law. See Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U.S. 618, 625, 98 S.Ct. 2010, 2015, 56 L.Ed.2d 581 (1978). But when [t]he Death on the High Seas Act ... does speak directly to a question, the courts are not free to 'supplement' Congress' answer so thoroughly that the Act becomes meaningless. Id. Mr. Alcabasa asks us to go even a step further than supplementing Congress's pronouncement: He requests that we ignore Congress's clear determination that only a personal representative may bring a wrongful death action arising from an accident on the high seas. We, of course, must decline. 22 Although it does not bear directly upon the resolution of this case, it is worth noting that where only a personal representative may maintain a wrongful death suit, persons in Mr. Alcabasa's position are not without recourse to protect their legal rights. Some courts have found, for example, that a potential beneficiary of a wrongful death claim may be permitted to intervene in a suit if he can establish that his interests are at odds with the decedent's personal representative. See, e.g., Smith v. Clark Sherwood Oil Field Contractors, 457 F.2d 1339, 1345 (5th Cir.1972). Furthermore, a personal representative has a fiduciary duty to bargain for the rights of all the decedent's beneficiaries and to turn over to them their appropriate share of any proceeds. See, e.g., Chicago, Burlington & Quincy R.R. v. Wells-Dickey Trust Co., 275 U.S. 161, 163, 48 S.Ct. 73, 73-74, 72 L.Ed. 216 (1927); Calton v. Zapata Lexington, 811 F.2d 919, 922 (5th Cir.1987). A failure to do either can give rise to a cause of action against the personal representative. Calton, 811 F.2d at 922.