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Article

19 Apr 2014

Author:
John Bellinger, Lawfare (USA)

Kiobel Anniversary Surprise: Judge Scheindlin Rules Corporations May Be Held Liable Under ATS, Despite Second Circuit Precedents [USA]

…Judge Scheindlin held, in the long-running Apartheid litigation, that corporations may be sued under the Alien Tort Statute. Her decision directly conflicts…with the Second Circuit’s…decision in Kiobel (holding that corporations are not subject to liability under the ATS) but also with the Second Circuit’s post-Kiobel decision…in the Apartheid case (deciding that the ATS suits against the defendants in the Apartheid case were barred by the Supreme Court’s decision in Kiobel)…Judge Scheindlin authorized the plaintiffs to…amend their complaints against Ford and IBM …to provide evidence that the companies’ activities “touch and concern” the territory of the United States…Scheindlin agreed to dismiss the two remaining foreign corporate defendants — Daimler AG and Rheinmetall…Scheindlin finds that by concluding in Kiobel that “mere corporate presence” is not sufficient to overcome the presumption against extraterritoriality, the Supreme Court by necessity implies that “corporate presence plus additional factors can suffice...”...[Refers to Daimler AG, Ford, IBM & Rheinmetall]

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Médecins Sans Frontières

Apartheid reparations lawsuits (re So. Africa)