Businesses haled into a Texas court should be able to argue, based on the Texas Supreme Court’s decision in Moki Mac River Expeditions v. Drugg, 2007 WL 623805 (Tex. 2007), that even if they did have contacts with Texas, such as e-mail communications or a website, the connection between those contacts and the subject matter of the plaintiff’s claim is too attenuated to support an exercise of personal jurisdiction. While many courts have seemed eager to exercise long arm jurisdiction on the basis of websites and other internet contacts, the Texas Supreme Court has bucked this trend by placing some strong new limitations on when it will be appropriate to exercise jurisdiction over an out-of-state business based on such contacts. The Druggs’ son was killed during a river rafting expedition in Arizona organized by Moki Mac, a Utah based river-rafting outfitter. The Druggs reviewed Moki Mac’s brochures and website and decided to send their son Andy on the expedition. After he was fatally injured, the Druggs filed suit in Texas for wrongful death due to Moki Mac’s negligence and for intentional and negligent misrepresentation. The lower courts denied Moki Mac’s jurisdictional challenge.
The Texas Supreme Court reversed, holding that a Texas court did not have jurisdiction over the nonresident company because its contacts with Texas were not substantially connected with the operative facts of the litigation. Moki Mac had not established continuous and systematic contacts with Texas. Accordingly, for Texas courts to exercise to exercise personal jurisdiction over Moki Mac, (1) Moki Mac must have made minimum contacts with Texas by purposefully availing itself of the privilege of conducting activities in the state, and (2) Moki Mac’s liability must have arisen from or been related to those contacts. The court noted that Moki Mac did purposefully avail itself of the privilege of conducting business in the Texas market by directly marketing to Texas residents, regularly advertising in Texas, soliciting Texas residents using direct-marketing e-mail campaigns, and establishing channels of regular communication with its Texas customers.
Nevertheless, the court concluded that because Moki Mac’s liability did not arise from its contacts with Texas and was not related to those contacts, there was no personal jurisdiction. The court explained that there must be a substantial connection between those contacts and the operative facts of the litigation. That connection did not exist in this case because the operative facts of the case focused on the guides’ conduct of the expedition and whether they exercised reasonable care in supervising Andy. Those events, which would be the focus of any trial, all took place in Arizona. While the contents of Moki Mac’s brochures and website might have had some connection with the operative facts that led to Andy’s death, the court found that this connection was not sufficiently direct to meet due process concerns. Under Moki Mac, businesses may be able to argue that websites, e-mail marketing, and other advertising in a state is insufficiently related to personal injury claims occurring outside the state to support an exercise of jurisdiction.