McKesson HBOC, Inc. v. Islam Repub Iran

United States Court of Appeals for the district of columbia circuit No. 00-7157 September Term, 2001 Filed On: January 11, 2002 [650226] McKesson HBOC, Inc., et al., Appellees/Cross-Appellants v. Islamic Republic of Iran, Appellant/Cross-Appellee Consolidated with 00-7263 Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (No. 82cv00220) Before: Edwards, Rogers and Tatel, Circuit Judges. O R D E R Upon consideration of the appellants' petition for rehearing, filed December 31, 2001, it is ORDERED that the opinion in McKesson HBOC, Inc. v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 271 F.3d 1101 (D.C. Cir. 2001), be amended as follows: (1) The paragraph beginning "Iran argues that even if some elements of its expropriation . . . ." be deleted in its entirety. (2) The following paragraph be inserted in its place: "Iran argues that even if some elements of its expropriation had direct effects in the United States, federal courts may not exercise jurisdiction over one particular aspect of that claim: Pak Dairy's withholding of McKesson's dividends. In support of this proposition, Iran argues first that in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia v. Nelson, 507 U.S. 349 (1993), the Supreme Court established an exclusionary principle under which no fact that could not have independently served as grounds for jurisdiction may serve as a basis for a foreign state's liability, and second, that the "direct effects" exception to claims based on commercial transactions does not apply where, as here, the place of payment lies outside the United States. In our view, the first argument has no merit, thus rendering the second irrelevant. Nelson held that commercial- activity jurisdiction cannot exist unless the commercial activity that forms the basis for jurisdiction also serves as the predicate for the plaintiff's substantive cause of action. See 507 U.S. at 357-58. Here, McKesson's extensive showing of direct effects flowing from the commercial activity on which its cause of action rests establishes the nexus found lacking in Nelson. Regardless of whether denial of dividends alone would give rise to federal court jurisdiction under the FSIA's commercial-activity exception, because the net effect of Pak Dairy's cut-off of commercial ties included not just nonpayment, but also the cessation of "the flow of capital, management personnel, engineering data, machinery, equipment, materials, and packaging," McKesson I, 905 F.2d at 451, the district court rightly considered the dividends issue in both in determining that Iran had expropriated McKesson's equity interest and in awarding damages for that expropriation." Per Curiam FOR THE COURT: Mark J. Langer, Clerk BY: Deputy Clerk