Mississippi is a control state for wine sales. Mississippi law prohibits the importation, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages by anyone other than the state itself (at least generally). But the state found three out-of-state online wine retailers who were shipping product directly to consumers in Mississippi. The state sued the three retailers seeking injunctive relief and monetary damages.
The defendants argued that Mississippi lacked personal jurisdiction because of the transactions F.O.B. terms – that is, the terms stated that all sales were F.O.B. the retailer’s place of business (in this case California or New York) and, as such, it was the buyer’s responsibility to comply with Mississippi law. In other words, because title passed to the consumer in the retailer’s state, the retailer did nothing to violate the laws of the buyer’s state. The Mississippi trial court agreed with the defendants and dismissed the case. The Mississippi Supreme Court, however, reversed that decision and remanded finding:
The Defendants attempt an end run around Mississippi law and the purposeful-availment due-process requirement by employing F.O.B. terms that customarily govern the shipper’s costs and loss from destruction or breakage during delivery. Were it that simple to defeat jurisdiction, almost no entity that engages in interstate sale of goods and products would be amenable to suit outside of that entity’s principle state of business—regardless of their purposeful contact(s) with the other state.
