Robert Carbone v. Wulf Kaal, et al.

Columbus, Ohio personal injury lawyers represented the Plaintiff on a defamation claim.





Robert Carbone, who lives in Connecticut, sued two Swiss organizations and several individuals who live in California, Illinois, and Switzerland for defamation and other tortious conduct. Carbone was a member of the two Swiss organizations. He claims that the defendants used websites to publish defamatory statements about him and to facilitate his removal from the organizations. He decided to file suit in Ohio. Why Ohio? Because the Swiss organizations maintained servers in Ohio that hosted the organizations' websites. So Carbone's theory is that the allegedly improper statements about him would have passed through the servers in Ohio on the way to their destination. Nothing else connected any of the parties to Ohio.



* * *



A plaintiff filing a lawsuit in federal court bears the burden of establishing a prima facie case that the district court can maintain personal jurisdiction over each defendant. Peters Broad. Eng'g, Inc. v. 24 Cap., LLC, 40 F.4th 432, 437 (6th Cir. 2022). He can meet this initial burden "merely through the complaint.” Malone v. Stanley Black & Decker, Inc., 965 F.3d 499, 504 (6th Cir. 2020) (citation omitted). This requires "establish[ing], with reasonable particularity, sufficient contacts between the defendant and the forum state to satisfy the relevant long-arm statute and the Due Process Clause.” Id. (citations omitted).

Affirmed