[00:00:12] Speaker 01: Good morning. Good morning. May it please the court. Scott Geiser on behalf of appellant Leonard Mitchell, who is also with us in the courtroom. I'd like to reserve three minutes for rebuttal. [00:00:25] Speaker 01: The district court's order granting Air India's motion to dismiss should be reversed with instructions to enter an order denying the motion or alternatively to allow jurisdictional discovery. The standard review is de novo and I'd like to start, since we're dealing with specific personal jurisdiction, the test that was to be applied. It's unclear from the district court order what test exactly was applied. I do note at a point there is the mention or the use of the words purposely directed, so it looks like the Calder test was applied, but it is not clear. [00:00:59] Speaker 01: But based on the instructions from this court, recently in Davis, Doe versus Lufthansa, Briskin versus Shopify, it's not a rigid standard. Both tests actually should be looked at, but also recently in in herbal brands versus photo plaza this court said that the purposeful availment test should be applied in contract in contract cases as well as unintentional tort cases that the call their effects test should be applied in an intentional tort we're dealing with a negligence claim so based upon what this court has said in herbal brands we should be first looking at this under purposeful availment which is where I will start and I think a couple Cases to note that I think help guide us in this analysis. [00:01:44] Speaker 01: I was starting with Sinatra versus National Enquirer from this circuit 854 f second 1191 and talked about the fact that a non-residence defendants act of soliciting business in the form state will generally be considered purposeful of ailment if that solicitation results in contract negotiations or the transaction of business and Also from the Supreme Court, Asahi Metal versus Superior Court of Solana 480 U.S. [00:02:14] UNKNOWN: 102. [00:02:15] Speaker 01: In the plurality, Justice O'Connor said, and I quote, marketing the product through a distributor. who has agreed to serve as a sales agent in the forum state, may evidence purposeful availment. And that really is our case. [00:02:29] Speaker 04: And is your argument that Star Alliance is both advertising and selling the ticket, that United is advertising and selling the ticket? Who's doing the promotion in California? [00:02:40] Speaker 01: So I think Star Alliance is doing the promotion, but United is the one that is actually doing the sales. They're the ones that have the agreement with Air India to sell their tickets as part of this round-world trip that is being promoted to California residents in exchange for a commission. And that's really what I focus on. I think what is the case here, because the closest case in the entire country is that Selke versus German wings event. [00:03:10] Speaker 01: That is the closest factual matter that we have. But when I look at all of the different cases that deal with an injury such as this that occurs on an airline or a flight that originates outside of the United States but results in injury, the commonality where either they find that there is personal jurisdiction in the form or not seems to be where were the tickets purchased? [00:03:37] Speaker 01: And if they are purchased in the form, that is a big factor. Is there a commission arrangement? And are these tickets all purchased as part of a package? And so when you look at the cases that go our way, COIL, which is a district court case at Oregon, 180F sub 1160. [00:03:56] Speaker 01: A little different arrangement, the Chute v. Carnival Cruise Lines case out of the Ninth Circuit. That was a commission arrangement on a cruise. Gullet v. Qantas Airways, 417F sup 490. [00:04:09] Speaker 01: The Selke case, Vergara v. Aeroflight, 390F sup. [00:04:14] Speaker 02: With respect to the transactions that put Mr. Mitchell in Mumbai, what actor is there in California other than United? [00:04:26] Speaker 01: So it is United, and that is the analysis. So Air India authorizes United to sell tickets on its behalf, and under California law, that is effectively an agency type of arrangement. I know this court asked before argument to look at three different cases, one of which being the Yamaha case, and I assume because it dealt with… The issue of agency, that is a different scenario when you're looking at parent subsidiary liability. We're not looking at that. [00:04:53] Speaker 02: We're looking – I don't think that's limited to a parent subsidiary liability. No, I – It includes agency liability. [00:05:00] Speaker 01: It does talk about agency liability, and the focus was, well, do you have the ability to control the agent, which you do. I mean, United has – Right. [00:05:09] Speaker 00: So if he – I mean on your theory of agency, suppose that – different facts. He goes to the United counter at LAX to buy his ticket. Sure. And as he's going up to the United counter, he slips and falls or like they – the United ticket agent commits some – do you think he could sue Air India because like it's an agency relationship? Well, that would be a different scenario because Air India... Well, that would be a different scenario, but is the logic of your position that Air India would be subject to personal jurisdiction based on that? [00:05:46] Speaker 01: So... [00:05:48] Speaker 01: I mean, I'd have to go to and find that the reason that he slipped and fall had something to do with Air India's actions, right? [00:05:56] Speaker 00: Because obviously... Well, I mean, I thought on your theory of agency, like we can impute if United is negligence and that's imputable to the principal. [00:06:04] Speaker 01: No. So United is not negligence here. So the negligence occurs through Air India employees helping him board the plane. So that is not what's at issue. There's no dispute that the claim of [00:06:17] Speaker 00: So you're saying we can impute United's actions to Air India not for purposes of liability, but just for purposes of assessing contacts for personal jurisdiction? [00:06:27] Speaker 01: Exactly right. So for the purposes of determining whether or not Air India purposely availed itself of the benefits of California such that it can be held accountable in California for its negligence acts that occurred boarding this flight and moved by. [00:06:43] Speaker 01: Based on the cases, you look at, yes, the fact that Air India purposely availed, directed, whichever test you actually want to look at, because I think you can do it under purposely direct, too. They are choosing to be part of a package that originates out of California that is focused on California residents. [00:07:01] Speaker 02: Incident doesn't occur out of any contact establishing availment of Air India. [00:07:10] Speaker 02: I believe it does. [00:07:12] Speaker 02: In California. What contact is that other than United selling the ticket? [00:07:16] Speaker 01: Well, that is. That is the contact. The contact is the decision to sell a ticket or be part of a ticket package that is going to originate and be promoted to California residents. [00:07:28] Speaker 02: You also mentioned Star Alliance. Does that mean your answer would be the same to the other 25 airlines that are part of Star Alliance? [00:07:38] Speaker 01: if they were part of the package. So it's in the record, all the different legs that were purchased as part of this package. [00:07:44] Speaker 02: In this particular case, but vis-a-vis the establishment of personal jurisdiction. Sure. So if Lufthansa had flights going in and out of San Francisco International, has the same contacts that Air India has, if that was the flight where the incident occurred, United would then be an agent with substantial control by Lufthansa? [00:08:14] Speaker 01: So if I'm understanding, if Lufthansa was one of the legs in the package that was purchased and authorized United to sell that package or that flight in exchange for a commission and the injury happened due to Lufthansa's, yes, then Lufthansa would be the one that would be liable immediately. In that situation. And I find that consistency in the cases. [00:08:35] Speaker 02: The personal jurisdiction in California. [00:08:37] Speaker 01: Correct. Exactly. I mean, if you just substituted which flight it happened, but it was still part of the package, then yes. [00:08:43] Speaker 02: Because each of those 26 other airlines would have a substantial control using the Yamaha test over United. [00:08:54] Speaker 01: Well, not necessarily. Because, I mean, each member of the Star Alliance was not part of this package. [00:09:01] Speaker 02: With respect to Mr. Mitchell. [00:09:02] Speaker 01: Right. [00:09:03] Speaker 02: But it's a confederation that exists in Frankfurt. [00:09:07] Speaker 02: Right. They're all part of the same operation. And this was just nothing in the record that suggests that this is anything unusual in this execution of the Star Alliance program. [00:09:24] Speaker 02: Nothing in the record that suggests that. [00:09:28] Speaker 01: Well, I'm not sure what you're referring to. So Star Alliance, like One World or whatever, they're the collections of airlines that decide to affiliate together and work together in exchange for different arrangements. And so we're dealing with the Star Alliance package. Now, of the Star Alliance airlines, we would only be looking at any Star Alliance airline that chose to participate in this particular package that was being sold to California residents in exchange for a commission. Again, if Lufthansa was not part of this package, then there would be no jurisdiction over La Stanza just because it was part of the Star Line. [00:09:59] Speaker 02: Mr. Mitchell was who picked who his partners. He was the one who picked which airlines he was going to fly on. [00:10:06] Speaker 01: No, and that was the testimony that is in the record. This is a specific package, and it says in there you have to fly these flights in this order in order for this to be valid. So there isn't that discretion. [00:10:17] Speaker 04: So example – Oh, but that can't be right. I mean if he didn't want to stop in some – I mean he had – he must have said I want to go to these places, and then they gave him those tickets. Correct. [00:10:27] Speaker 01: Correct, but what airlines can he use? So as an example, I don't know what other airlines fly that are Indian-based airlines, but I'm assuming whatever the other one is that's not part of the Star Alliance would not be available as part of the package. [00:10:39] Speaker 04: You could only buy Air India to fly within India because that is who – And I assume part of your argument in response is that if Air India didn't want to be part of these packages, it could say, I don't want to sell to people from California. [00:10:53] Speaker 01: Correct, correct. [00:10:54] Speaker 04: To support that, would we need more discovery? [00:10:57] Speaker 01: Well, that is one thing, and that's why I asked for it. We don't have and did not have the opportunity to get in exactly what the arrangement was. The Air India attorney did admit on the record that there was an interline agreement of some kind and that Air India would get a commission. But when I asked for, let me get the extent of what this thing is, let me actually look at the contract, what are the details, I was not granted any of that. The jurisdictional discovery was denied. [00:11:23] Speaker 02: Do you agree if there was a jurisdictional discovery that one of the issues that would have to be addressed is substantial control by Air India over United? [00:11:34] Speaker 01: I think the substantial control over what United is allowed to do and is allowed to sell, yes. I mean, agency relationships are limited based upon the terms, and so we would have to find out what those terms are, and we didn't have that opportunity. [00:11:46] Speaker 04: Do you think you need them to be a full agent in the sense of agency law, or do you think you just need them to be a – seller of tickets for their purpose? [00:11:54] Speaker 01: I think it just needs to be a seller of tickets. There's actually a good discussion in the Gullet Qantas case out of Tennessee that cites to a Fifth Circuit decision where the airline in that case was Qantas, tries to say, well, these are all independent contractors, and the Fifth Circuit basically says, that's not really... [00:12:11] Speaker 01: We don't care. [00:12:13] Speaker 01: First of all, what label you put on it doesn't really matter. The law determines whether or not you're actually an agent or not. But when you authorize an intermediary to sell, that would not promote fair play and substantial justice if you could just put that intermediary there and then prevent yourself from being hailed into court. [00:12:29] Speaker 00: How do you reconcile that with the cases about parents and subsidiaries that Judge Battagliano mentioned? Because this seems to be a fortiori from those and that whatever sort of control – or relationship there is, it's less than you have in that context. And there we've said that you can't necessarily impute the contacts of the subsidiary. [00:12:49] Speaker 01: And actually, I don't agree with that. I mean, if I'm looking specifically at the Yamaha case and how they were trying to establish parent-subsidiary liability, it was more of just like you're the parent, you're the subsidiary, parent has control without really establishing anything significant there. It was just more of that general thing that people like to throw out there is that it's just a parent has this domineering control of the subsidiary, and I think they also got into alter ego, and it was more of like a, you know, throw everything at the wall and hold something, you know, kind of sticks, where if you look at these kinds of cases that just deal with an authorized sales agent, right, where you're actually authorized a sales agent to sell, those ones from what I've seen in the cases have all found that that was sufficient authority to establish an agency relationship, limited, but such that you could find jurisdiction on that basis. [00:13:40] Speaker 04: Or maybe you should – would it be better to think of it just as a sales – you can impute the sale as a sale that is a contact and not talk about agency at all? I mean do you think we need the concept? [00:13:51] Speaker 01: I don't think you do, and actually if you look at your Shopify decision, the Briskin case, what did you have there? There was no direct relationship between the plaintiff and Shopify. Shopify contracted with a third party to acquire data, information of the resident Californians, but that wasn't discussing an agency relationship. You just kind of had a sales relationship between Shopify and the party that plaintiff actually did contract with, and you found – jurisdiction sufficient there under purposeful available I think that is kind of the same scenario that we're talking about same with the shoot division decision for carnival again it was a commission arrangement a sales agent sold that carnival ticket in exchange for a commission and that sales arrangement was sufficient to establish jurisdiction because The contract here is between Mr. I should interrupt you because we have you over your time. [00:14:43] Speaker 01: Sorry. [00:14:44] Speaker 04: I'll still give you two minutes for rebuttal, but let's hear from the other side. [00:14:46] Speaker 01: The contract is between my client and Air India. It just was arranged through a third party. And so I don't know that you need to get into the agency relationship that you're discussing. Thank you. [00:15:09] Speaker 03: Good morning. [00:15:10] Speaker 03: May it please the court. Ivy Nowinski of Condon and Forsyth on behalf of Appellee Air India Limited. [00:15:17] Speaker 03: Can you guys hear me okay? It's a little quiet, but I don't know that that's... Just need to stand a little closer? That's great. All right. This court should affirm the district court's decision dismissing Mitchell's lawsuit for lack of personal jurisdiction and declining to permit jurisdictional discovery. [00:15:35] Speaker 03: The only issue before the court is whether it may exercise specific personal jurisdiction under the facts of the case, which are as follows. [00:15:43] Speaker 04: Mitchell alleges that he booked – We know the facts, so could I just go ahead and ask a question? Of course. So do you concede that if this – if United had done all of the flights, so United actually operated every leg, that United would be liable? Yes, Your Honor. [00:16:01] Speaker 04: And so is the only difference here that Air India essentially hired United to sell the ticket? [00:16:08] Speaker 03: Well, Your Honor, I would disagree with the characterization that Air India hired United to sell its tickets. [00:16:16] Speaker 03: And to expand on that a little bit more, I think that the relationship between United and Air India in this case is actually very different from a parent-subsidiary relation. I didn't say it was a parent-subsidiary. [00:16:27] Speaker 04: I mean, they could hire... me to sit at SFO and sell tickets. I mean, they could hire anyone. It seems like they have an arrangement where United sells tickets on their behalf. And why isn't that how we should understand it? [00:16:41] Speaker 03: Well, Your Honor, in similar cases, evaluating, for example, an airline's relationship with its travel agent, that has not been held to be sufficient. For example, in Fisher v. Qantas, In that case, Qantas was the operating carrier and had a travel agency in Arizona that sold a Qantas ticket to the plaintiff who was then injured on a Qantas flight in – I'm sorry. I'm mixing up the facts, but he was injured over in either New Zealand or Australia. [00:17:08] Speaker 04: I think it's a district court case, though, so we have to figure out if the district courts have been deciding this correctly. So why – So if Air India – let's go back. If Air India had sold the ticket in San Francisco, would you agree that Air India had liability? [00:17:27] Speaker 03: If it had been booked directly through Air India's website to a passenger in California and the passenger was then injured on an Air India flight in India – then I think, yes, I would concede that, Your Honor, if it had been sold directly to a California resident by Air India. [00:17:43] Speaker 04: I think that has to be right. And so then I'm just struggling with why the idea that Air India essentially has someone else do the contacting California for it, why that should make a difference. [00:17:55] Speaker 03: Well, Your Honor, I think it's a little different than that. I think what we have here is Mitchell reaching out beyond his home to his home state of California to in an affirmative act to purchase a ticket or contract of carriage within the state of India – or within the country of India, rather. [00:18:10] Speaker 03: We have – it's actually the plaintiff himself who reached out. It is not United who reached into California. [00:18:14] Speaker 00: I mean, I have to say I'm a little bit surprised by your answer to the question of, like, would it be the same if Air India had done it, and I – I'm not sure that had to be the answer, but if that is the answer, I too then am struggling to see why it makes a difference that the person or, I guess, website that he buys a ticket from in California is an employee of Air India or an employee of a different company that has a contract with Air India. Either way, Air India has decided to have a relationship with somebody in the forum state who's selling tickets to people. [00:18:53] Speaker 03: Let me give the caveat here that in connection with Judge Friedland's prior hypothetical, I think Air India would also have to carry the plaintiff out of the state of California. Air India would have to be performing all of the legs of that contract of carriage in order to keep that connection with California that was articulated by the majority panel in Doe v. Lufthansa. There, the court found both purposeful directions. [00:19:15] Speaker 00: So then you're saying that like if So if he's planning to get to India on his own in some other way and he just walks up to the counter at LAX and there's an Air India employee there and he says, you know, I want to buy a ticket from Mumbai to Dubai and they sell it to him, then you say no personal jurisdiction? [00:19:37] Speaker 03: It would be difficult for me to say that if a plaintiff had actually formed a contract of carriage in California. with the actual carrier, that there was no personal jurisdiction. But I think that under Williams v. Yamaha, the situation is different here because Air India – I think it's rather absurd to argue that Air India has any control whatsoever over United Airlines. [00:20:00] Speaker 00: What if it were – what if it were purely an action on – a contract action? So he buys the ticket from United for a carriage on Air India and he gets to Mumbai and they say – We have decided not to fly you, and so then he has to arrange other travel and sues for the increased cost just on the contract. [00:20:24] Speaker 03: And so the question is, is that purposeful availment? Yeah, yeah. [00:20:27] Speaker 00: I mean, he's just suing to enforce the contract, which he formed with United on behalf of Air India in California. Isn't that the issue? [00:20:40] Speaker 02: What's United? [00:20:43] Speaker 02: The contract is with United. United books it on Air India, as I understand it, on behalf of Mr. Mitchell. [00:20:53] Speaker 02: Mitchell is dealing with United. United is dealing with Air India, and there is no direct contract at the point of purchase between Mitchell and Air India, is there? [00:21:10] Speaker 03: No, Your Honor. I agree with that characterization. And here I think under Williams v. Yamaha, the Ninth Circuit has said – it's actually Judge Smith who wrote the dissent in Doe v. Lufthansa. He held in – or the panel held rather in that case that even assuming some form of the agency test survives, Daimler and Ronza v. Nike – that the plaintiff must show substantial control. And I just, I don't think there's any allegation of that. [00:21:40] Speaker 03: And in fact, plaintiff's allegations of agency in the complaint are identical. [00:21:45] Speaker 04: I'm struggling though. So can we go back to just the fact, maybe, I don't know if it's a legal question or a factual question, but this issue of who the contract is with, because your answer to Judge Battagliano isn't how I had been understanding it. I thought that when he bought this round the world ticket, he actually had a, an Air India ticket for that segment. And so he did have a contract with Air India. But are you saying he didn't? [00:22:10] Speaker 03: He does have a contract. So he purchased 18 contracts of carriage through United Airlines, including, for example, on carriers such as Thai Airways, who don't even operate to the United States. So that's another fallacy that we have here. So are we subjecting Thai Airways, who doesn't even operate in the United States, to personal jurisdiction here if that incident happened? [00:22:27] Speaker 04: Well, I guess a follow-up question is, could Thai Airways say to United, even though we're part of Star Alliance, We're worried about California courts. We don't want you to sell any tickets that start in California or that you sell to a person in California. [00:22:40] Speaker 03: Well, Your Honor, I don't know the answer to that question. I assume so, but I don't know. [00:22:44] Speaker 04: I assume so, too. I can't imagine how else. I mean, it's got to be that tie. whoever they are, could say we don't want to do business in California. I can't understand why that wouldn't be the case. And if that's the case, why isn't that the amount of control you need for a sale to count as a sale? I mean, we don't need all full agency, but if you're going to delegate your sales to someone else, as long as you can say whether to sell it or not, I don't know why that's not still a sale to you. [00:23:12] Speaker 03: Well, because I mean, again, this hasn't really been analyzed at least by the Ninth Circuit in the context of a ticket sale, this precise issue, but it has been analyzed in the context of an agency-subsidiary relationship. And the amount of control that a fully-owned parent company has over its subsidiary is so much more substantial than that exercise by United here. [00:23:31] Speaker 04: If you're using Williams for that, though, Williams specifically said they didn't present any facts of any control, and so they just move on from that. Like, once they say the general test doesn't apply anymore, they then say... And there were no other facts of control, so done. I mean, I don't think we know what amount of control would be needed. And they also have the footnote, right, that says we're not talking about specific jurisdiction. I just don't think Williams talked about this. [00:23:57] Speaker 03: I mean, my reading of Williams is that it requires substantial control by either the parent over the subsidiary, you know, the contracting carrier versus the issuing carrier. It would require substantial control. And, again, this is not in the record. There's been no discovery, but I think it's a matter of common knowledge that United can just go over there and issue whatever they want on any carrier stock so long as they have an interline agreement with them. The actual airline is not exercising substantial control over that interaction. [00:24:23] Speaker 03: And by the actual airline, I mean the carrier that actually performs the carriage, the operating carrier. [00:24:31] Speaker 04: I think I misspoke. I don't think there's a footnote in Williams. I think it's above the footnote where they say that – even assuming the validity of some formulation of agency analysis such that the subsidiary's context could be attributed to its agent's appellants failed to establish specific jurisdiction. I mean, they just don't analyze what that is. [00:24:49] Speaker 03: Well, I will say that in Williams v. Yamaha, the allegations of agency are virtually identical to those in the complaint in this case. They are virtually identical, and they are the same plain vanilla agency allegations that are typically in a complaint. There's no allegation, and nor is there any evidence before the court. [00:25:03] Speaker 04: Was Williams' thing about a sale on behalf of someone else? [00:25:07] Speaker 03: I believe in Williams, the wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha was selling outboard motors in California. Yes. [00:25:16] Speaker 04: I guess. Well, one difference, though. OK. [00:25:20] Speaker 04: This gets to another question I have about K2. But in Williams, there would have been someone in the forum who you could sue. [00:25:29] Speaker 04: Who sold the motor, whereas here. [00:25:32] Speaker 04: You either can get to Air India or you can't. There's no way to sue Air India in the United States or anywhere in the United States on your theory. [00:25:42] Speaker 03: For this contract of carriage, no. No, Your Honor. [00:25:45] Speaker 04: So has anyone litigated a K2 theory? A 4K2? [00:25:52] Speaker 03: Your Honor, I'm not sure that I'm prepared to discuss 4K2 today. I'm only vaguely familiar with 4K2. [00:26:00] Speaker 03: But happy to submit a supplemental brief, if your honors would like, on that issue. But it hasn't been – 4K2 hasn't been asserted as a basis for personal jurisdiction by plaintiff here. [00:26:16] Speaker 04: As a policy matter, if – like, does it seem troubling that no one could be – that Air India could not be sued in the United States for this issue? [00:26:28] Speaker 03: No, Your Honor, not to me. When you make a contract of carriage to fly around the world, when you affirmatively put yourself out there and travel to remote locations, and in fact when you don't make those contracts directly with the carrier themselves as well, Air India is another layer removed here. Nobody went to Air India's interactive website in California and bought this ticket. I think you take that risk that if something happens to you there, you have to sue there. [00:26:55] Speaker 03: And in fact, plaintiff's counsel has advised that plaintiff doesn't tend to file suit in India. [00:27:05] Speaker 04: I think we've exhausted our questions. Thank you. Thank you. Let's put a few minutes on the clock for rebuttal. [00:27:20] Speaker 01: Thank you. And if there's any particular place you want me to start, I can certainly start. [00:27:24] Speaker 04: I guess what is your best answer to the Williams v. Yamaha that it's equivalent because it's a sale? [00:27:29] Speaker 01: Yeah, and I don't think Williams v. Yamaha is the same in that respect. I think you have a very different scenario than that case. I mean, I think you're hitting it on the head as far as what the control is. And Air India, I mean, again, this almost begs the reason why there should be jurisdictional discovery. But to the extent that You can rule based upon what's on the record at this point in time. It is entirely logical and common sense that Air India, when it enters into this interline agreement, can say sell here, don't sell here. [00:28:00] Speaker 01: It has those options. And when it relinquishes control and says you have control. You believe they have those options. We believe. Again, this is why we asked to see the contract and jurisdictional discovery so we can say definitively. But all we had was the representation of counsel at oral argument is that there is an interline agreement that allows United to sell Air India tickets in exchange for a commission. And that's relinquishing control. I mean, that is on that particular thing, a complete relinquishment of control of who United can sell to and as part of what package. [00:28:32] Speaker 01: And that's why I say, again, I go through the different cases. And that is the defining fact that where a district court is either finding or not finding purposeful availment. If you look at the one case that counsel cited, the Fisher v. Qantas, that was the issue, was that the travel agent had no relationship with Qantas. The airline flight that was coming out of Arizona had nothing to do with the Qantas package. It was a United flight, and United had nothing to do with Qantas. [00:29:04] Speaker 01: The fact that this is a packaged deal is kind of what Your Honor was saying before. You can treat it as if Air India was doing everything. [00:29:13] Speaker 02: What is your theory in suing United and then letting them out of the case? [00:29:20] Speaker 01: So under the Montreal Convention, as far as what airline you can sue is very limited. And so because it was very clear based upon the designation of the flight number. It was an Air India flight. It wasn't a United flight with a co-chair arrangement under the Montreal Convention. We could only sue Air India. But it actually does bring up a point, Judge Friedland, you were asking about the, you know, is it fair that you can't sue Air India anywhere? [00:29:50] Speaker 01: Well, you can sue them in India, actually. In India, which is... [00:29:55] Speaker 00: Well, that brings up a question I wanted to ask, which is if we were to rule for you here, presumably they will file a motion to dismiss on the basis of form nonconvenience. And in response to that motion, what will you say? [00:30:09] Speaker 01: Well, I think part of it is because you have the analysis of the last prong of personal jurisdiction where you kind of go through that similar analysis. And the closest case this court just dealt with, Doe v. Lufthansa, fairly similar. [00:30:24] Speaker 00: I'm not sure I view the last prong of personal jurisdiction as coextensive with permanent convenience. [00:30:30] Speaker 01: But I think that it actually is more convenient to do this case in California because the majority of this case is not about what happened in Air India. There's video. There's photos. [00:30:43] Speaker 01: That's not really – part of it. It's going to be what are the injuries and what's the medical treatment, and that's all here. [00:30:49] Speaker 01: And so I don't think that there would be an issue on form non-convenience, but that... Form non-convenience basically assumes jurisdiction. Right. [00:30:57] Speaker 02: Correct. So therefore, assuming personal jurisdiction, it's still not convenient. Right. So therefore, what Judge Miller is asking is a very, very viable question. [00:31:07] Speaker 01: Right. And I would say that I don't think that there would be an issue of that, given the Again, with technology today, having depositions done remotely is not an issue. The medical providers for Mr. Mitchell are all here. He is here. Air India operates in California, so I don't think that there would be that issue, and I think we'd successfully defeat such a motion if one were filed. But it gets to the point of even though the Montreal Convention, you look at it and it has that one prong that talks about where – the airlines can be sued, and I know that's a subject matter jurisdiction as opposed to a personal jurisdiction, but I think it is relevant the fact that the Montreal Convention added specifically that an action can be brought in the form of the passenger, and if the flight is basically originating and ending there, which is exactly what we have, and I think it was contemplated that a carrier such as Air India would not be able to escape jurisdiction in the United States based upon basically saying that I'm only allowing a third party to sell my ticket, I'm not doing it directly. [00:32:08] Speaker 04: But there's been no discussion of federal rule of civil procedure 4K2 in this case so far? [00:32:18] Speaker 04: Thank you both sides for the helpful arguments. Thank you. This case is submitted.