Jurisdiction and Settlement Offers. Law Essay. Give a full answer.
Instructions:
Give a full answer. Consider the facts, including what is given and what can be presumed from the facts. Then apply the rules regarding subject matter and personal jurisdiction to those facts to obtain your answer and explain it. Submit your answer as an attached file. Please review the rubric and example before completing short paper.
Assume that you live in California and are on vacation, traveling by car from California to Texas. You are injured in a motel room when the bed on which you are sleeping collapses, causing you to fall to the floor. You suffer substantial back and leg injuries, requiring many medical treatments and causing you to miss work for 15 weeks. Your medical bills total $50,000 and your lost wages total $15,000. You intend to sue the owner of the Texas motel.
Can you bring your case in federal court? Why or why not?
Can you commence the case in California? What additional information might you need to answer this question?
At the end of the trial, the jury awards you $100,000 ($50,000 for medical, $15,000 for lost wages and $35,000 for punitive damages). After the trial, the attorney for the hotel approaches and offers to settle the case for $50,000. Should you consider accepting the settlement? Why or why not?
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Jurisdiction and Settlement Offers
The plaintiff has a right to present their injury case which caused the physical pain and the monetary injury to the federal courts because they do have subject matter jurisdiction. The federal courts do have subject matter jurisdiction over cases involving citizens from two different states (Beatty et al. 66). The law provides that if two parties have issues over a particular matter and they belong to different states, their case can be heard by the judges in the federal court. The section of the law which gives this mandate is called diversity jurisdiction. The federal courts hear cases where the amount involved in the controversy is more than $75,000 (Beatty et al. 66). The actual amount out of pocket here is $65,000 which would be awarded for the damages, and the pain caused. It also includes the amount to cover future injuries and suffering associated with injured in the present ordeal. In this case, this case has a controversy amount of $100,000 which means that the case can be heard by the jury since the actual amount awarded exceeds the $75,000.
Whether the California court can hear this case depends on the nature of the motel where the actual injury occurred. The issue of personal jurisdiction over the Texas motel owner needs to be analyzed by satisfying the “minimum contacts" requirement of the Due Process Clause (Beatty et al. 62). If the owner of the motel has a series of many another motel throughout the country including in California, the California...