The first battle in many air crash cases is over the forum. While diversity jurisdiction compels many aviation cases to be heard in federal court, removal from state court can be blocked if the plaintiff properly names a non-diverse defendant or brings suit in a state court where any defendant is a citizen. In that circumstance, aviation defendants, who generally prefer to litigate in federal court, have aggressively asserted numerous other bases of federal jurisdiction to remove a case from the state court chosen by the plaintiff. This article reviews a series of aviation cases where the removal issue was recently litigated.
Federal Jurisdiction
A series of decisions have considered whether to remand state court aviation tort claims removed by airlines, operators and manufacturers, who claimed that federal aviation laws established federal jurisdiction over aviation accident litigation.
