Author Archives: John Coyle

On August 19, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued its latest decision on foreign forum selection clauses in cruise ship contracts.  The case was Turner v. Costa Crociere S.P.A.  The plaintiff was an American cruise ship passenger, Paul Turner, who brought a class action in federal district court in Florida alleging that theContinue reading “Forum Selection Clauses and Cruise Ship Contracts”

An exclusive forum selection clause gives a court a valid reason not to exercise its jurisdiction to hear a case. It cannot, however, take that jurisdiction away. Every now and then, judges get confused on this point. They start to think that an exclusive forum selection clause strips jurisdiction from other courts. This is notContinue reading “An Exclusive Forum Selection Clause Cannot Deprive a U.S. Court of Jurisdiction”

There is no question that the law of forum selection clauses can be complicated.  There are, however, some issues that are relatively straightforward.  When a legislature enacts a statute announcing that an outbound forum selection clause is void when written into a particular type of contract, for example, the clause is probably not enforceable.  ThisContinue reading “It Pays to Know About… State Statutes Voiding Outbound Forum Selection Clauses”

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