From Nada v. United Arab Emirates, decided by Judge Amy Berman Jackson (D.D.C.) today:
Plaintiffs Hazim Nada and his privately owned oil company, Lord Energy SA ("Lord Energy"), brought this action seeking more than a billion dollars in damages from a number of defendants, including the United Arab Emirates ("UAE"), a Swiss investigative firm and its founders and employees, a Swiss journalist, and an American academic.
They allege that defendants conspired to eliminate Lord Energy as a competitor to the UAE's state-owned oil company in the spot market for light crude oil exported to Asia. Plaintiffs claim that the alleged association of individuals and entities, which they refer to as an "enterprise" as that term is defined by the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations ("RICO") Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1962(c), "managed, directed, and bankrolled a years-long 'dark' public relations campaign" in which they falsely linked Lord Energy to the Muslim Brotherhood and other terrorist organizations, including al-Qaeda.
As a result, plaintiffs claim, financial institutions refused to lend them money, and Lord Energy and its U.S. subsidiary, Americas Lord Energy, went bankrupt. They filed the lawsuit to recover damages for the economic harm that the alleged campaign caused to their business and reputations….
[T]he Court will GRANT the UAE's motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction since the UAE is immune from suit in the United States under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, and no statutory exception applies; it will GRANT the Alp defendants' and Besson's motions to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction; and it will GRANT Vidino's motion to dismiss because the sole count against him fails to state a claim that he joined the alleged conspiracy. Given those rulings, the Court need not take up the merits of the extravagant and problematical claims brought under the Lanham Act, RICO, and the Sherman Act.
The Court finds that notwithstanding its length and unnecessary detail, the amended complaint is nothing more than a defamation case in search of a legal theory.
It is also an action in search of a basis to require a foreign sovereign and other foreign entities and individuals to defend themselves in the United States. There are no allegations of commercial activity in the United States or commercial acts in the United States in support of commercial activity abroad, and to the extent plaintiffs suggest that defendants' activities abroad were directed at the United States, the complaint does not allege any direct effect in the United States which forms the gravamen of any claim.
As for the one individual based in the United States, the allegations against him fail to state a claim. Nothing in this opinion is meant to suggest, though, that the knowing dissemination of false accusations of connections to the Muslim Brotherhood or other terrorist organizations could not cause real harm or that would be is an appropriate tactic….
