Suna Lee (Of Counsel-Madison, NJ) was granted a Motion to Dismiss this case in its entirety for lack of personal jurisdiction without the need for jurisdictional discovery following extensive briefing and oral argument in Union County Superior Court. Suna represented a valve manufacturer. The third-party plaintiff, a plumbing company that installed a toilet with a valve alleged to have caused extensive property damage in a commercial building located in New Jersey, filed a Third-Party Complaint against our client, who supplied the valve, alleging the valve was defective. Our client, incorporated under the laws of Delaware and headquartered in Illinois, sold the valve to the toilet manufacturer - a Wisconsin company - and shipped it to its warehouse in Texas. Accordingly, in lieu of an Answer, Suna moved for dismissal of all claims based on our client's lack of minimum contacts. The court agreed with Suna that recent Supreme Court jurisprudence limited general jurisdiction and rejected the stream of commerce theory argued by the plaintiff's counsel and further agreed that jurisdictional discovery was not warranted given the absence of a prima facie case of jurisdiction. The alleged property damage to the commercial building totaled approximately $500,000 and the action involved numerous defendants engaging in extensive litigation and motion practice.
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