Another Decision of Interest on the Alien Tort Statute: Flomo v. Firestone (7th Cir.)

Hot on the heels of last week’s D.C. Circuit decision on corporate liability under the Alien Tort Statute, the Seventh Circuit issued a decision today in Flomo v. Firestone Natural Rubber Co. (No. 10-3675). The opinion by Judge Richard Posner begins:

This suit under the Alien Tort Statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1350, pits 23 Liberian children against the Firestone Natural Rubber Company, which operates a 118,000-acre rubber plantation in Liberia through a subsidiary; various Firestone affiliates and officers were also joined as defendants. . . . The plaintiffs charge Firestone with utilizing hazardous child labor on the plantation in violation of customary international law. The Alien Tort Statute confers on the federal courts jurisdiction over “any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” The principal issues presented by the appeal are whether a corporation or any other entity that is not a natural person (the defendant is a limited liability company rather than a conventional business corporation) can be liable under the Alien Tort Statute, and, if so, whether the evidence presented by the plaintiffs created a triable issue of whether the defendant has violated “customary international law.”

--A

(Hat Tip: Howard Bashman)