Court Opinion

ID: 9467058
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:36:53.887313+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:07.733647
License: Public Domain

LUMBARD, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
I agree with the conclusion of the majority that the New York district court could entertain a Rule 60(b) motion to vacate the registered Georgia federal court judgment and that the Georgia court lacked in person-am jurisdiction over defendants. I write separately because I reach this conclusion by a somewhat different route.
The transaction giving rise to this suit involved an agreement between a Swiss corporation (Resintex) and a wholly-owned Haitian subsidiary (Haitex) of a Georgia corporation (Covington) for the purchase and sale of denim. Discussions leading up to the agreement took place in Switzerland and the goods were to be delivered to Haiti. Georgia’s only contacts with the transaction were: (1) several communications between Resintex in Switzerland and the president of Covington and Haitex in Georgia with respect to financing; (2) financing in part through letters of credit established at Covington’s Atlanta bank; and (3) arrival at the Georgia bank of invoices and bills of lading forwarded from Switzerland through normal banking channels.
The plaintiffs sought to avail themselves of the enforcement machinery of the New York courts by registering the Georgia judgment of $183,000 pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1963, which provides that a judgment of one district court “shall have the same effect as a judgment of the district court of the district where registered and may be enforced in like manner” (emphasis added). *738When Covington thereafter instituted garnishment proceedings in the New York Supreme Court in Suffolk County, the appellees moved in the Eastern District Court, under Rule 60(b) to vacate the Georgia default judgment. On July 5, 1979, Judge Pratt ordered that the Georgia judgment be vacated.
As the majority opinion notes, a judgment entered without jurisdiction over the parties is a nullity, and an enforcing court can examine the jurisdiction of the rendering court provided inquiry is not foreclosed by res judicata. See Baldwin v. Iowa State Traveling Men’s Association, 283 U.S. 522, 51 S.Ct. 517, 75 L.Ed. 1244 (1931). The Georgia court clearly did not decide the question of jurisdiction over Resintex since judgment was entered following default. Covington nevertheless argues that Rule 60(b)(4), which provides that a court “may relieve a party . . . from final judgment” on the ground that “the judgment is void,” was not a proper vehicle for relief in the New York court from the judgment rendered in the Georgia court.
Although we have not squarely decided the question here presented, our decisions present no impediment to the action taken here by Judge Pratt. In Hadden v. Rumsey Products, 196 F.2d 92 (2d Cir. 1952), we did not reach the question of whether a registered judgment could be attacked in the court of registration by way of a motion under Rule 60(b), but held that the defendant’s petition to the New York court could be “treated as an independent action to obtain equitable relief from the [registered] judgment” and that by attempting to register the judgment pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1963 in New York, the plaintiff had waived any question as to the personal jurisdiction of the New York court.1 In Graciette v. Star Guidance, Inc., relying in part on Hadden, a district court of registration permitted collateral attack by means of Rule 60(b), noting that “an event sufficient to confer personal jurisdiction for an independent action would be sufficient to confer such jurisdiction for a 60(b) motion raising the same issues.” 66 F.R.D. 424, 426 (S.D. N.Y.1975) (footnote omitted). See also 7 Moore’s Federal Practice 1 60.28[1] (2d ed. 1979). Under these circumstances, there is no reason why Rule 60(b)(4) should not be as appropriate a means for attacking a judgment registered in the New York court as it would be for attacking a judgment rendered in the New York court.' Nor is there any reason why the New York court should be unable to do by means of Rule 60(b) that which it could do by means of an independent equitable action.
Of course, Judge Pratt, in the exercise of his discretion, could have held that the Georgia court was a more suitable forum for the motion. See United States v. Fluor Corp., 436 F.2d 383 (2d Cir. 1970); Tommills Brokerage Co., Inc. v. Thon, 52 F.R.D. 200 (D.P.R.1971). Here, however, where the judgment was entered by default in a federal court of collateral jurisdiction, he certainly did not abuse his discretion by declining so to hold.

In Personam Jurisdiction in Georgia

Although Covington asserts that the Georgia court had jurisdiction under either subsection (a) or subsection (b) of the Georgia long-arm statute, its argument in its brief on appeal is limited to subsection (b). Accordingly, I limit my analysis to that subsection.2
*739Subsection (b) of the Georgia long-arm statute has been interpreted broadly to provide jurisdiction where tortious conduct outside the state gives rise to injury within the state. See, e. g., Atlanta Coliseum, Inc. v. Carling Brewing Co., 411 F.Supp. 253 (N.D.Ga.1976); Coe & Payne Co. v. Wood-Mosaic Corp., 230 Ga. 58, 195 S.E.2d 399 (1973). Relying on this interpretation, Covington urges that the defendants’ fraudulent misrepresentations as to the denim’s shrinkage factor, contained in communications and invoices sent into Georgia, constitute a tortious act out of the state leading to injury in the state.
The real complaint in this action, however, is that the delivered goods did not conform to the contract specifications. “As a general rule, breach of contract does not constitute a tort.” Synthetic Industries, Inc. v. Whitlock, Inc., 439 F.Supp. 1297, 1300 (N.D.Ga.1977). Covington cannot avoid this general rule by alleging that since the goods did not comply with the contract specifications, the communications containing these specifications were fraudulent. Cf. Unistrut Georgia, Inc. v. Faulkner Plastics, Inc., 135 Ga.App. 305, 217 S.E.2d 611, 612 (1975) (where plexiglass dome did not meet contract specification, duty breached arose “from the contract alone, and is not one imposed by law” despite allegation of “negligent fabrication”). Covington’s reliance on Thorington v. Cash, 494 F.2d 582 (5th Cir. 1974)¡ is similarly misplaced.3 As the majority notes, in Thorington the non-resident had “purposefully availed himself of the privilege of conducting business within the forum State. . .” Id. at 587. Surely the same cannot be said of Resintex, particularly since the involvement of the Georgia bank was initiated by Covington when Haitex was unable to obtain sufficient credit in Haiti. Furthermore, the gravamen of the complaint in Thorington was fraud in the inducement to contract, not breach of contract.
Any duty breached by Resintex was a duty arising out of the contract. The breach occurred when noncomplying goods were shipped to Haiti. Since Resintex did not commit a tort in Georgia, and since the contract was neither negotiated, signed nor performed in Georgia, Resintex was not subject to the in personam jurisdiction of the Georgia federal court.

. Although the majority opinion states that “precedent exists supporting the proposition that Rule 60(b)(4) may be invoked in the registration court,” the only decision of this Court cited is United States v. Fiuor Corp., 436 F.2d 383 (2d Cir. 1970). In that case, the district court had ruled that the rendering court provided a more suitable forum for appellant’s Rule 60(b)(5) motion. We affirmed. The opinion in Fluor recognized that a court may, in certain circumstances, grant relief against a judgment registered there, but also noted that “[t]he powers of a district court to grant relief against a judgment registered there under 28 U.S.C. § 1963 have not been comprehensively delineated.” Id. at 384 85. There was no need to delineate these powers in Fluor.

. I agree with Judge Meskill that there were insufficient contacts between defendants and Georgia to justify jurisdiction under subsection (a).

. In Thorington, the court drew an analogy between “stream of commerce products liability cases” and material misrepresentations sent into the forum state by the non-resident. While this analogy may be useful in a case, like Thorington, involving fraud in the inducement to contract, I see no similarity between a “stream of commerce products liability case” and the case now before us, where the parties have entered into a contract and any injury is directly attributable to the failure of one party to comply with that contract.