Reference no: EM132873476

Assignment 1 - Personal Jurisdiction Exercise

Ewing Oil Corp., a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in California, is an oil distribution company that operates principally in North and South America. It entered a long-term Crude Oil Supply Agreement ("Agreement") with Barnes-Wentworth, Inc., an Oklahoma-based company incorporated in Oklahoma and Buenos Aires Petroleum Co. (BAPCO), the Argentinian state oil company based in Buenos Aires, Argentina (BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth generally did business together). The parties entered the Agreement at a meeting in Barnes-Wentworth's Dallas office after months of negotiations, which also occurred in Texas at Barnes-Wentworth's Dallas office (Barnes-Wentworth has several major oil production facilities in Texas that are supervised and managed out of the Dallas field office). The Agreement was entered into in order to generate a market for BAPCO's and Barnes-Wentworth's crude oil through Ewing Oil's extensive U.S. distribution and retail channels.

Under the terms of the Agreement, BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth were supposed to supply crude to Ewing Oil at an agreed discount rate compared with what the two charged on the open market. Over time, however, Ewing Oil came to believe that BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth were overcharging it for crude oil and demanded repayment of the excess amounts paid. When BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth refused to issue payment, Ewing Oil brought suit on the contract against Barnes-Wentworth and BAPCO in Texas federal court, demanding $100 million dollars in damages. Both defendants were served at their respective headquarters. Assume Texas has a long-arm statute permitting the exercise of jurisdiction over all parties to contracts negotiated and/or executed in Texas.

In response to the complaint, BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth both filed motions to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. How should the court rule?

Please write your response in a manner that cited applicable case law and/or applicable statutes. An IRAC-style essay would be appropriate for this assignment.

Assignment 2 - Subject Matter Jurisdiction Exercise

1. Is there diversity between the parties in the following cases?
a. McNulty, from Ohio, sues Bunk, from Ohio, in a federal district court in Georgia.
b. Omar, from Virginia, sues McNulty (Ohio) and Bunk (Ohio).
c. Omar (Virginia) sues McNulty (Ohio) and Stringer (Montana) in a federal district court in Ohio.
d. Omar (Virginia), Stringer (Montana), and Lester (New Hampshire) sue McNulty (Ohio), Bunk (Ohio), and Bubbles (Virginia).
e. McNulty (Ohio) sues Omar (Virginia) and Greggs, an Italian citizen residing in Italy.
f. Same facts as (e), except that Greggs, still an Italian citizen, lives in Ohio.

2. McNulty (Ohio) sues Bunk (Ohio) in federal court in Ohio for damages under a federal firearms control statute. May the court hear the case?

3. Bubbles, a Virginian, decides to move to Nevada. He buys a BMW from YouBugMe Volkswagen, a Virginia dealership incorporated in Virginia, and sets off with his family for Nevada. While driving through Oklahoma, he is involved in an accident and hospitalized.

a. Two months late, while still in the hospital, Bubbles files a negligence suit against YouBugMe in an Oklahoma federal court. Does the court have diversity jurisdiction?

b. While in the hospital, Bubbles receives an offer to stay in Oklahoma and work as a detective for an oil company. He accepts and several months after beginning work sues YouBugMe in federal court. Is the suit proper?

c. Bubbles is released from the hospital after six months. The company he planned to join in Nevada has rescinded its job offer since he was unable to start work when it needed him. He still has six months of rehabilitation ahead of him in Oklahoma. After that, he plans to begin looking for a job as a detective in the oil industry, wherever one turns up. Is he diverse from YouBugMe?

Assignment 3 - Erie Doctrine Exercise

Idaho has a statute that prohibits the introduction of evidence of unconscionability in contract actions. The statute was enacted because the legislature felt that the courts had been invalidating too many contracts on the basis of claims of unconscionability, with the result that many businesses were deciding to stop doing business in Idaho to avoid having large numbers of their contracts deemed to be unenforceable.

In federal court, judges have adopted, given the absence of any Federal rules on the matter, the practice of allowing any evidence relevant to a contract dispute to be presented.

Kramerica Distributors, Inc., a New York corporation based in New York, sues Elaine, an Idaho citizen, in Idaho federal court for breach of contract for her failure to make $100,000 in payments on men's undergarments (the "Bro") she purchased from them. At trial, Elaine offers evidence that the contract between her and Kramerica is unconscionable.

Kramerica objects to the introduction of this evidence, citing the Idaho statute prohibiting such evidence. How should the court rule on the objection?

Attachment:- Civil Procedure.rar