Judge declaws key part of Massachusetts lobstermen's libel lawsuit against California aquarium

A federal judge in Louisiana ruled this week there's no rational reason for Massachusetts lobstermen to sue a California aquarium for libel in Louisiana, which has a law against disparaging seafood, and so ordered the case moved to California, where you're free to say what you want about harvested sea creatures.

Aa group of lobstermen from Gloucester, Marion, North Truro and Plymouth had sued the Monterey Bay Aquarium earlier this year for a press release in which the aquarium said the way lobsters are caught off New England endangers the increasingly rare Atlantic right whale and urged companies and consumers to consider other briny alternatves.

The steamed lobstermen, hoping to become lead plaintiffs in a class action on behalf of all 1,800 or so Massachusetts lobstermen, charged the claim was mean and wrong and cost them significant money after several retailers and home food-delivery services, including Whole Foods and Hello Fresh, stopped buying their product.

The lobstermen claimed Louisiana was an appropriate venue because the aquarium is effectively a Louisiana "resident" since the Web site on which it posted its press release is accessible from Louisiana and since people there buy, or bought, New England lobsters from retailers under the aquarium's alleged control.

But also, Louisiana has a unique law a unique law that prohibits disparaging aquacultural products - making it one of 13 states with food libel laws.

After considering a request from the aquarium to transfer the case to a federal court in California, where it's based, and which has no such law, Judge Greg Gerard Guidry of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana ruled Thursday that the lobstermen's venue argument was just a bunch of tomalley, because federal lawsuits need to be brought either where a defendant is a "resident" or where the allegedly offensive action took place, and that neither was the case for Louisiana.

In his decision, Guidry first culled the argument that the fact that Louisianans can read a Web site in California makes the aquarium a Louisiana "resident."

[T]he United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has expressly held that "[m]aking a website that’s visible in [the forum state] . . . does not suffice" to establish personal jurisdiction [by a judge]. And as the United States Supreme Court has explained when considering whether an alleged libelous statement on a website can form the basis for personal jurisdiction over a defendant, "[w]hat matters is whether [the defendant] aimed the alleged libel at [the forum state]."

The aquarium press release does not target Louisiana specifically, Guidry continued, leading into the next venue issue, whether the effects of the aquarium's actions in publishing a press release occurred primarily in the Pelican State.

The judge shelled that argument as well, starting with dismissing the lobstermen claim that the aquarium had effectively forced Whole Foods and other companies to pull New England lobster:

MBA's recommendations on the Seafood Watch website are just that - recommendations. The fact that those companies followed MBA's recommendation in the Press Release to Plaintiffs' alleged detriment does not show that MBA "controls" those companies in any way. Accordingly, this Court cannot assert personal jurisdiction over MBA via imputation to it of those companies' contacts with this forum.

And then Guidry circled back to the issue of whether the press release on the aquarium Web site was somehow uniquely Cajun:

Here, the "event or omission" giving rise to Plaintiff's claim was MBA's act of publishing the Press Release. The Court presumes that this event occurred in Defendant's headquarters in the State of California as Plaintiffs have not alleged any evidence to the contrary. Because Plaintiffs make no allegation that the Press Release was conceived of, written in, or published from the State of Louisiana, the Court cannot find that venue is proper in the Eastern District of Louisiana.

Additionally, even if the Court could consider venue to be appropriate where the alleged harm or impact was felt, rather than where the conduct occurred, venue would still not be proper in the Eastern District of Louisiana. The alleged harm in this case is the "substantial monetary harm" suffered by Plaintiffs. This alleged monetary harm would have primarily been felt in the State of Massachusetts, where Plaintiffs live and work, not in the State of Louisiana. Thus, the Eastern District of Louisiana is not the proper venue for this dispute.

Guidry concluded by ordering the case transferred to the Northern District of California in Oakland.