## Facts

- Mauricio Iragorri, a Florida domiciliary and naturalized U.S. citizen, died after falling down an open elevator shaft in an apartment building in Cali, Colombia.
- His widow and two children, also Florida domiciliaries, brought suit asserting wrongful-death-related claims.
- At the time of the accident, the widow and children were temporarily in Colombia while the children attended school in an exchange program.
- Plaintiffs alleged that Otis Elevator Company designed, manufactured, installed, or maintained the elevator equipment involved and that United Technologies Corporation was Otis’s parent company.
- Plaintiffs filed in the District of Connecticut against Otis (principal place of business in Connecticut) and United (principal place of business in Connecticut).
- Defendants moved to dismiss for forum non conveniens in favor of Colombia; the district court dismissed, giving limited weight to plaintiffs’ Connecticut forum choice because they lived in Florida and the injury occurred in Colombia.

## Issues

1. What degree of deference is owed to a U.S. plaintiff’s choice of a U.S. forum that is not the plaintiff’s home forum when deciding a forum non conveniens motion?
2. Whether the district court applied the proper deference framework to plaintiffs’ choice of the District of Connecticut and, in turn, properly balanced the forum non conveniens factors.

## Decision

- The Second Circuit (en banc) vacated the dismissal and remanded.
- The court rejected rigid rules that automatically give minimal deference to a U.S. plaintiff’s choice of a non-home U.S. forum.
- The court held that deference operates on a sliding scale tied to whether the forum choice reflects legitimate convenience or forum shopping.
- Because the district court appeared to undervalue plaintiffs’ U.S. forum choice under an incorrect approach, the forum non conveniens analysis had to be reconsidered.

## Legal Principles

- A plaintiff’s forum choice is entitled to deference, but the weight varies based on circumstances rather than categorical labels (home vs. non-home).
- The more the choice appears motivated by legitimate convenience (e.g., access to evidence, witness availability, defendant’s amenability to suit, reduced expense), the more deference it receives.
- The more the choice appears motivated by forum shopping (e.g., seeking favorable law, generous juries, or local popularity/unpopularity effects), the less deference it receives.
- After setting the proper level of deference, courts must apply and balance the traditional private- and public-interest considerations for forum non conveniens, assessed against that deference baseline.
- A U.S. plaintiff choosing a U.S. forum generally receives more deference than a foreign plaintiff, but a non-home U.S. forum choice still receives meaningful weight when supported by convenience.

## Conclusion

The en banc court clarified that deference to a U.S. plaintiff’s selection of a non-home U.S. forum in forum non conveniens is context-dependent and should be calibrated on a sliding scale keyed to convenience versus forum-shopping indicators, requiring remand for a renewed balancing of the private and public interest factors under the corrected deference framework.


Iragorri v. United Techs. Corp., 274 F.3d 65 (2d Cir. 2001) (en banc)