Opinion
Civil Action No. 3:97-CV-308-L
November 29, 2002
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
Before the court is Plaintiffs' Motion for Remand, filed March 17, 1997; and Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens and International Comity and to Enjoin Further Litigation, filed April 9, 1997. After considering the parties' motions, briefs, and the applicable law, the court grants in part and denies in part Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens and International Comity and to Enjoin Further Litigation, and denies Plaintiffs' Motion for Remand.
By order of United States District Court Joe Fish, this case was stayed pending the appeal of Delgado v. Shell Oil Company, 890 F. Supp. 1324, 1346 (S.D. Tex. 1995). As a result, the case was stayed from April 21, 1997 until plaintiffs' petition for certiorari was denied by the United States Supreme Court on April 16, 2001. See order dated April 21, 1997. After Delgado was decided, the parties submitted supplemental briefing from April 4, 2001 through October 23, 2001 on Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens and International Comity and to Enjoin Further Litigation.
I. Factual and Procedural Background
This suit is one of 470 or more personal injury suits that have been filed in various courts in Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, California, and Hawaii by foreign agricultural workers claiming injuries from exposure to the chemical pesticide dibromochloropropane ("DBCP") used on foreign banana plantations. All of the remaining plaintiffs in this suit, that is, those who were not previously dismissed, are citizens of Costa Rica and reside in Costa Rica. The named defendants, all of which are United States corporations, are manufacturers of DBCP or fruit growers alleged to have used DBCP. Plaintiffs originally filed this lawsuit in Dallas County district court on January 12, 1993, alleging state law claims for injuries sustained from exposure to DBCP manufactured by Dow Chemical Company, Shell Oil Company, and Occidental Chemical Corporation (collectively "Defendants").
Plaintiffs filed the lawsuit pursuant to Tex. Civ. Prac. Rem. Code Ann. § 71.031, which provides a Texas forum for personal injury and wrongful death actions arising from actions that took place in a foreign country belonging to a citizen of a foreign country that has equal treaty rights with the United States.
Defendants first removed the action to federal court on grounds of diversity and federal question jurisdiction. The action was remanded by Judge Solis in June of 1993 after determining that no basis existed for either diversity or federal question jurisdiction. In April of 1994, Defendants filed a third party petition against Dead Sea Bromine Co., Ltd. and Bromine Compounds, Ltd. (collectively "Dead Sea"), and Dead Sea removed the action pursuant to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, 28, U.S.C. § 1603, et seq. Plaintiffs then filed a motion to remand, arguing that removal was improper, because Defendants had failed to obtain leave of court to implead Dead Sea as required by Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 38. Adopting the reasoning in Delgado v. Shell Oil Company, 890 F. Supp. 1324, 1346 (S.D. Tex. 1995), Judge Fitzwater agreed with Plaintiffs, held that the removal was premature, and remanded the case to state court where Defendants filed a motion for leave to implead Dead Sea, which was denied, and a motion to dismiss the claims of Guatemalan plaintiffs for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, which was granted. As the case progressed towards trial, the remaining Guatemalan plaintiffs were either nonsuited with prejudice or involuntarily dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, leaving only the Costa Rican plaintiffs.
On January 21, 1997, Plaintiffs filed their Seventh Amended Petition. Within thirty days of filing its original answer, Defendants again, without leave of court, filed a third-party claim against Dead Sea. On February 14, 1997, Dead Sea removed the action to federal court. Plaintiffs filed a Motion for Remand, and Defendants filed a Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens and International Comity and to Enjoin Further Litigation, both of which are now before the court.
On April 2, 1997, Defendants filed a Motion to Stay Ruling on Remand pending the Fifth Circuit's resolution of the appeal in Delgado v. Shell Oil Co., 890 F. Supp. 1324 (S.D. Tex. 1995), a similar DBCP case, and on April 21, 1997, Judge Fish granted the motion. While awaiting the Fifth Circuit's opinion in Delgado, Plaintiffs settled with all Defendants except Dole Food Company, Inc. and Dole Fresh Fruit Company (collectively "Dole"). On August 25, 1998, the case was transferred to this court.
On January 31, 2001, the parties filed a Joint Status Report in which they agreed that the Fifth Circuit's October 19, 2000 opinion in Delgado controlled the disposition of Plaintiffs' Motion to Remand, but did not dispose of Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens and International Comity and to Enjoin Further Litigation. On April 4, 2001, Dole filed a Supplemental Memorandum in Support of Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens, and followed up on May 22, 2001, with its Notice of Significant Decision, alerting the court of the Fifth Circuit's decision in Delgado v. Shell Oil, 231 F.3d 165 (5th Cir. 2000), cert. denied, 532 U.S. 972 (2001), as well as the United States Supreme Court's denial of Plaintiffs' petition for certiorari.
II. Plaintiff's Motion to Remand
As a preliminary matter, the court notes that the parties agree Delgado v. Shell Oil, 231 F.3d 165 (5th Cir. 2000) is dispositive of Plaintiff's Motion to Remand, because the relevant facts, claims, and legal issues in this case are quite similar to those addressed by the Fifth Circuit in Delgado. The court agrees that Delgado controls the disposition of the issues raised by Plaintiffs' Motion to Remand.
Like the plaintiffs in Delgado, Plaintiffs here contend that removal was improper, because: (1) Defendants failed to obtain leave of court as required by Tex. R. Civ. P. 38 before impleading Dead Sea as a third party; (2) Dead Sea does not have foreign sovereign status; and (3) Dead Sea was fraudulently joined. Each of these issues was addressed by the Fifth Circuit and resolved against the plaintiffs. See id. at 182-83. The Fifth Circuit's discussion of 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b) and 1441(d) also disposes of Plaintiff's law of the case argument and their contention that the erroneous inclusion of nonsuited plaintiffs in the amended complaint is void. Id. at 176-78. Accordingly, the court determines that Dead Sea was a foreign state entitled to remove the action under § 1441(d) and denies Plaintiffs' Motion to Remand.
III. Forum Non Conveniens
Having determined that removal was proper, the court turns next to Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens. A defendant bears the burden of persuasion as to all elements of the forum non conveniens analysis. See In re Air Crash Disaster Near New Orleans, La., 821 F.2d 1147, 1164-65 (5th Cir. 1987) (en banc), vacated on other grounds sub nom., Pan Am. World Airways, Inc. v. Lopez, 490 U.S. 1032 (1989), opinion reinstated on other grounds, 883 F.3d 17 (5th Cir. 1989) (en banc). When considering a motion to dismiss for forum non conveniens, "the ultimate inquiry is where trial will best serve the convenience of the parties and the end of justice." Koster v. Lumbermen's Mut. Cas. Co., 330 U.S. 518, 527 (1947). In deciding a motion to dismiss for forum non conveniens, a court first determines whether an alternate forum is available and adequate. See Gonzalez v. Chrysler Corp., 301 F.3d 377, 379-380 (5th Cir. 2002). A foreign forum is available if the entire case and all parties can come within the jurisdiction of that forum. In re Air Crash Disaster, 821 F.2d at 1165. A defendant comes within the jurisdiction of an alternate forum when "`the defendant is amenable to process'" in the alternate forum at the time of dismissal. Veba-Chemie A.G. v. M/V Getafix, 711 F.2d 1243, 1246 (5th Cir. 1983) (quoting Piper Aircraft Co. v. Reyno, 454 U.S. 235, 255 n. 22 (1981)). A foreign forum is adequate if the parties will not be deprived of all remedies or treated unfairly even though they may not enjoy the same benefits as they might receive in an American court. In re Air Crash Disaster, 821 F.2d at 1165.
Upon determining that an alternative forum is both available and adequate, a court decides if the alternate forum is more convenient for the litigants by weighing the various private and public interest factors. See Gonzalez, 301 F.3d at 379-380. Only if a court concludes that dismissal is not appropriate based its review of the private interest factors, must it then weigh the public interest factors. Id. If a court determines that these factors favor the moving party, it may dismiss the case for forum non conveniens. Id. The decision to grant or deny a motion to dismiss for forum non conveniens is within the sound discretion of the trial court. American Dredging Co. v. Miller, 510 U.S. 443, 454 (1994). "[O]rdinarily a strong presumption in favor of the plaintiff's choice of forum, which may be overcome only when the private and public interest factors clearly point towards trial in the alternative forum . . . however, that the presumption applies with less force when the plaintiff or real parties in interest are foreign." Piper Aircraft, 454 U.S. at 255.
A. Availability of Costa Rica Forum
Plaintiffs do not contend that a Costa Rican forum is inconvenient. Instead, Plaintiffs argue that Costa Rica is neither available nor adequate, because: (1) defendant's willingness to submit to jurisdiction in another country is not a sufficient basis alone to dismiss for forum non conveniens; and (2) based on the 1995 Abarca litigation in Costa Rica, which was dismissed by Costa Rican courts for lack of jurisdiction, it is clear that Costa Rican courts will not exercise jurisdiction over this DBCP case, and forum non conveniens dismissal is therefore improper.
The Abarca case is one of the many DBCP suits brought by other banana workers against the defendants in this case. Following the forum non conveniens dismissal in the Delgado litigation, Costa Rican plaintiffs in that suit refiled their claims in Costa Rica on August 9, 1995 in a case styled Abarca v. Dow Chemical Corporation.
For support, Plaintiffs cite Delgado, 890 F. Supp. at 1367, arguing that the availability of a foreign forum depends not so much on a defendant's willingness to submit to the jurisdiction of a foreign court, but rather on the willingness of the foreign court to accept jurisdiction and hear a case. Plaintiffs reason that Costa Rica is not likely to accept jurisdiction over this case, because Costa Rican courts dismissed similar DBCP claims brought by the plaintiffs in Abarca for lack of jurisdiction. Defendants, on the other hand, contend that courts since Abarca, including the Fifth Circuit, have upheld the forum non conveniens dismissal of Costa Rican DBCP claims. Defendants also contend that Plaintiffs underhandedly obtained the Abarca dismissal from the Costa Rican court, when in fact, the cause of action could have been styled in such a way that the court would have accepted jurisdiction.
The cases cited by Defendants in their Supplemental Memorandum for this proposition focus primarily on the private and public interest factors and not the availability of a Costa Rica forum, which is the main issue of contention in this case. The court, therefore, finds that these cases provide little assistance in determining whether Costa Rica is available.
Contrary to Plaintiffs' assertion, the acceptance of jurisdiction was not the basis of the district court's determination in Delgado that a foreign court was an available alternate forum. Rather, the district court conditionally dismissed the case for forum non conveniens "to ensure the availability of an alternative forum." Id. Moreover, the Fifth Circuit has affirmed dismissals "where the alternative forum [was] available pursuant only to defendant's submission to jurisdiction there," reasoning that "[a] defendant's agreement to submit to the jurisdiction of the foreign forum, along with a conditional dismissal, `obviates the need for extensive inquiry into foreign jurisdictional law since, if the foreign court refuses to take jurisdiction, plaintiff is still protected by the conditional nature of the dismissal.'" Veba-Chemie A.G., 711 F.2d at 1249 (quoting Vaz Borralho v. Keydril Co., 696 F.2d 379, 392 n. 12 (5th Cir. 1983)). Thus, the court's conditional dismissal in Delgado is consistent with the Fifth Circuit's conclusion in Veba-Chemie A.G., that "conditional dismissal, by inducing defendant's submission to the jurisdiction of an alternative forum, is one particularly effective manner of assuring that the alternative forum is available." Veba-Chemie A.G., 711 F.2d at 1249. Accordingly, rather than making an extensive inquiry into Costa Rica's jurisdictional law at this juncture, the court assumes for purposes of this analysis that Costa Rica is available if forum non conveniens dismissal is conditionally granted.
B. Adequacy of Costa Rica Forum
To establish that Costa Rica is an adequate forum, Defendants offer the affidavit of Costa Rican law expert Miguel Blanco Quiros ("Quiros"), a former Chief Justice of the Costa Rican Supreme Court. In his affidavit, Quiros concludes that Costa Rica is an adequate judicial forum because: (1) "[a]n individual plaintiff in Costa Rica may bring an action for damages [pursuant to Article 1045 of Costa Rica's Civil Code] such as those alleged by plaintiffs in their action in the United States . . . if the person has suffered harm which has been caused by the act of another person, either intentionally or negligently;" Article 1045 also provides citizens with a right of action for money damages against the "manufacturer or distributor;" (2) workers may sue their employers for harm sustained during the course of employment and there are two forums in Costa Rica in which suits of this kind can be brought; (3) access to the courts in Costa Rica is free; there are no fees or taxes for filing or processing, and indigents need not guarantee the opposing party the payment of costs, which include costs for attorney's fees and bonds or deposits; (3) Costa Rica also recognizes a contingency fee basis for paying attorney's fees; (4) there is no limitation on damages recoverable; and (5) Costa Rica recognizes various means of proof. Plaintiffs do not contest the assertions made by Quiros, and the court determines, based on the foregoing evidence, that Plaintiffs will not be treated unfairly or deprived of all remedies by the courts. The court therefore finds that a Costa Rica provides an adequate forum for the claims asserted by Plaintiffs and turns to the next step in this analysis, the private interest factors.
C. Private Interest Factors
In analyzing the private interests of the litigants, courts consider: (1) the parties' access to sources of proof; (2) the availability of compulsory process for obtaining the attendance of unwilling witnesses; (3) the costs of obtaining the attendance of willing witnesses; (4) the ability to view the premises, if necessary; (5) the existence of other practical problems which may interfere with expeditious and inexpensive judicial review of the case; and (6) whether a judgment, if entered, would be enforceable. Gulf Oil Corp. v. Gilbert, 330 U.S. 501, 508 (1957). Courts also "weigh the relative advantages and obstacles to fair trial." Id. Thus, in considering these factors, the court is necessarily engaged in a comparison between the hardships defendant would suffer through the retention of jurisdiction and the hardships the plaintiff would suffer as the result of dismissal and the obligation to bring suit in another country. A plaintiff may not, though, "by choice of an inconvenient forum, vex, harass, or oppress the defendant by inflicting upon him expense or trouble not necessary to his own right to pursue his remedy." Id. Thus, it is not uncommon for courts to give less deference to a plaintiff's choice of forum when:
it appears that the plaintiff's choice of a U.S. forum was motivated by forum-shopping reasons — such as attempts to win a tactical advantage resulting from local laws that favor the plaintiff's case, the habitual generosity of juries in the United States or in the forum district, the plaintiff's popularity or the defendant's unpopularity in the region, or the inconvenience and expense to the defendant resulting from litigation in that forum . . . [when] convenience would be better served by litigating in another country's courts.Iragorri v. United Tech. Corp., 274 F.3d 65, 72 (2d Cir. 2001); see Delgado, 231 F.3d at 169.
Applying these factors and considerations to the present case, the court first notes that the Fifth Circuit in Delgado, a related DBCP case, recognized that:
[t]he filing of these [DBCP] cases in the state courts of Texas was by no means happenstance. In a classic exercise of forum shopping, Plaintiffs selected Texas because, among other plaintiff-friendly features, its law at the time of filing provided no applicable doctrine of forum non conveniens pursuant to which their actions could be dismissed.Id. Since it appears that Plaintiffs were motivated by such forum shopping, and none resides in Texas, the court accords little, if any, deference to Plaintiffs' choice of Texas as a forum in weighing the interests and inconveniences of the parties.
As stated previously, Plaintiffs do not contend that Costa Rica is inconvenient. On the other hand, Defendants argue that Costa Rica is the proper forum, because "the vast majority of relevant evidence is located in Plaintiffs' home country [Costa Rica]" and "this court cannot secure the attendance of vital foreign witnesses and third parties." For support, Defendants rely primarily upon the affidavit of Burton Ballanfant ("Ballanfant"), a senior litigation attorney employed by Shell, who has over twenty years of experience in defending against DBCP suits, including those filed by foreign agricultural workers since 1983. According to Ballanfant, to assess the extent of Plaintiffs' injuries caused by exposure to DBCP, Defendants must obtain information concerning the amount of DBCP that Plaintiffs were exposed to, the length of exposure, and the manner of exposure, because all relevant literature on DBCP suggests that DBCP, as is the case with all toxins, follows a dose/response curve based on the route of exposure. This information is therefore necessary to secure reliable expert testimony concerning the physical response a person would be expected to have. In addition, Ballanfant asserts that for Defendants to defend against Plaintiffs' claims, Defendants need to develop evidence of the individual plaintiff's exposure, if any, to DBCP by examining Plaintiffs and Plaintiffs' sexual partners, interviewing witnesses, including co-workers, supervisors, and employers, that would have knowledge of the length, manner, method, and frequency of Plaintiffs' exposure, and reviewing Plaintiffs' employment records and medical records, all of which are located in Costa Rica.
Ballanfant also states that Plaintiffs have thus far only produced 14 of the 1,314 Costa Rican Plaintiffs for deposition in the United States, and Defendants have no way of verifying the accuracy of this testimony or refuting it without the evidence located in Costa Rica, which Defendants have no access to, because it is beyond the jurisdiction of courts in the United States. Ballanfant acknowledges that Plaintiffs have provided some written discovery, but he states that this has proved to be unreliable and incomplete, because Plaintiffs have disavowed prior statements in their sworn interrogatories and have been unable to admit that their responses to Defendants' requests for admissions were accurate when made. Ballanfant further states that Defendants need to discover evidence regarding other parties' involvement, including importers, purchasers, distributors, government entities, or local employers not yet named as defendants in the suit that would be potential third-party defendants if it was determined that these entities or persons acted negligently or failed to comply with label warnings and instructions or other legal requirements imposed by foreign [Costa Rican] law; and that a majority of this information is in foreign countries [Costa Rica]. Finally, Ballanfant notes that this documentary evidence and witness testimony are exclusively in Spanish.
Despite the fact that Ballanfant is obviously an interested witness, the court agrees that the overwhelming majority of documentary evidence and witnesses, including Plaintiffs themselves, are in Costa Rica and beyond the subpoena power of this court. Moreover, even if Defendants could compel unwilling witnesses to appear in Dallas or the parties stipulated to such, the cost of transporting witnesses and the cost of interpreters to translate witness testimony and documentary evidence would be enormous. The court therefore determines these factors weigh in favor of dismissal, and Plaintiffs have presented no evidence or arguments to the contrary. Out of an abundance of caution, however, the court considers the public interest factors to determine if forum non conveniens dismissal is justified.
D. Public Interest Factors
The Supreme Court has set forth the following public interest factors for purposes of forum non conveniens analysis: (1) the administrative problems which flow from court congestion; (2) the interest in having localized controversies resolved at home; (3) the interest in having a court which is familiar with the applicable law to handle the case; (4) the unfairness in burdening citizens with jury duty in a case which is unrelated to the forum; and (5) whether conflicts of law issues will arise and whether foreign law applies. Gulf Oil Corp., 330 U.S. at 508-09. As the Supreme Court explained in Gulf Oil Corp., these factors have a place in applying the doctrine of forum non conveniens because:
Administrative difficulties follow for courts when litigation is piled up in congested centers instead of being handled at its origin. Jury duty is a burden that ought not to be imposed upon the people of a community which has no relation to the litigation. In cases which touch the affairs of many persons, there is reason for holding the trial in their view and reach rather than in remote parts of the country where they can learn of it by report only. There is a local interest in having localized controversies decided at home. There is an appropriateness, too, in having the trial of a diversity case in a forum that is at home with the state law that must govern the case, rather than having a court in some other forum untangle problems in conflict of laws, and in law foreign to itself.Id. These considerations should therefore be kept in mind when weighing the public interest factors.
Here, Defendants maintain that dismissal is appropriate because: (1) Plaintiffs' claims are governed by Costa Rican law; (2) Texas has no significant interest in this litigation; and (3) Plaintiffs' claims impose an inappropriate burden on the United States judicial system. The court agrees and determines that the convenience of the parties and interests of justice would be best served if this action was conditionally dismissed and refiled in Costa Rica. Neither the Defendants nor Plaintiffs have ties to Texas. Plaintiffs are all citizens of Costa Rica and currently reside in Costa Rica, and the chemical exposure that allegedly caused Plaintiffs to become sterile occurred in Costa Rica. As a result, a majority of the witnesses and evidence necessary to try the case are in Costa Rica. The court has determined that the laws and remedies available in Costa Rica are adequate, and Defendants have agreed to submit to the jurisdiction of the courts in that country. Consequently, no purpose would be served by trying the case in Texas other than to burden Texas courts and Texas juries with litigation that has no relation whatsoever to Texas. Moreover, it makes more sense in a case such as this in which all of the 1,314 Plaintiffs are Spanish speaking to try the case in Costa Rica, where the courts are not only much better equipped to deal with any language barriers.
For all of the reasons stated, the court finds that the case could most expeditiously and inexpensively be tried in Costa Rica and therefore grants Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens. The dismissal, however, must be conditioned to ensure that Plaintiffs can reinstate their suit in American courts in the event Defendants evade jurisdiction in Costa Rica or Costa Rica declines to exercise jurisdiction. Baris v. Sulpicio Lines, Inc., 932 F.2d 1540, 1551 (5th Cir.) (citing In re Air Crash Disaster, 821 F.2d at 1166), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 963 (1991). Accordingly, the court conditions the dismissal on the following: (1) Defendants' consent to submit to the jurisdiction of Costa Rica; (2) the acceptance and exercise of jurisdiction by Costa Rican courts; (3) Defendants' waiver of all statute of limitations defenses if Plaintiffs file suit in Costa Rica within 90 days of this court's dismissal; (4) Defendants' agreement to the enforceability of a judgment entered by a Costa Rican court; (5) Defendants' consent to reinstatement of the action in its present posture in the Northern District of Texas if Costa Rica proves to be unavailable, because the highest court of Costa Rica declines to exercise jurisdiction despite Plaintiff's good faith efforts to initiate the action in Costa Rica. Baris, 932 F.2d at 1551 (setting forth measures a court may take to ensure that a defendant will not attempt to evade the jurisdiction of the foreign court).
The court conditions any reinstatement of the present action on: (1) a certification by Plaintiffs following the present forum non conveniens dismissal, that Plaintiffs made a good faith effort to initiate the action in Costa Rica and was unable to receive an adjudication on the merits under the laws of that country so that Costa Rica was unavailable within the meaning of the pertinent authorities, and (2) that upon the filing of a motion for reinstatement, a reassessment will be made as to the availability of the Costa Rican forum, and if it is determined that it was not available, Plaintiffs' motion for reinstatement will be granted and any applicable statute of limitations will be deemed to have been tolled by the initiation of the present action. The court conditions reinstatement upon Plaintiffs' good faith efforts, because the main issue of contention is the availability of Costa Rica. Moreover, Defendants contend that Costa Rica only declined to exercise jurisdiction over the Delgado action, because counsel for plaintiffs, the same attorneys that represent Plaintiffs in this action, informed the Costa Rican courts through pleadings filed that they preferred to pursue their claims in Texas courts and urged the Costa Rican courts to not assert jurisdiction. This is not to say, however, that the court adopts wholesale the contentions and assertions made by Defendants. The court recognizes that the issue of availability is hotly contested and therefore conditions dismissal and reinstatement for the protection of both parties to ensure that neither party engages in tactical maneuvering to either defeat jurisdiction in Costa Rica or unreasonably delay and impede the trial of this matter. The court will not cite to examples this time, but it notes that the parties have not spoken with total candor in asserting their respective positions and reciting facts to the court. These types of tactics serve only to delay the administration of justice in an extremely complex case. In all future filings, the court fully expects the parties to speak and write with complete candor.
IV. Injunction Against Further Suits
In addition to dismissal, Defendants seek a permanent injunction to prevent Plaintiffs from filing any future state or federal DBCP related lawsuits in the United States. As stated previously, this suit and other related DBCP suits that have no relation to Texas are obviously the product of forum shopping; however, because a considerable amount of time has passed since this suit was first filed in January of 1993, and Defendants have presented no evidence, which indicates that Plaintiffs will commence new DBCP-related actions in other courts, the court determines that a permanent injunction is not warranted. Moreover, the type of conduct Defendants complain of is more appropriately addressed, if necessary, by the imposition of sanctions pursuant to the Fed.R.Civ.P. 11 or the court's inherent powers to impose sanctions. Accordingly, the court denies Defendants' Motion to Enjoin Further Litigation.
V. Conclusion
For the reasons stated herein, Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Forum Non Conveniens is conditionally granted; Defendants' Motion to Enjoin Further Litigation is denied; Plaintiffs' Motion for Remand is denied; and this action is dismissed subject to the conditions stated herein. Because the court is dismissing this action on forum non conveniens grounds, it need not address Defendants' alternative basis for relief, international comity.