I started this assignment, but having issues filling in some of the information:
Original Assignment:
Ewing Oil Corp., a Delaware
corporation with its principal place of business in California, is an oil
distribution company that operates principally in North and South America.
It entered a long-term Crude
Oil Supply Agreement (“Agreement”) with Barnes-Wentworth, Inc., an
Oklahoma-based company incorporated in Oklahoma and Buenos Aires Petroleum Co.
(BAPCO), the Argentinian state oil company based in Buenos Aires, Argentina
(BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth
generally did business together). The parties entered the Agreement at a
meeting in Barnes-Wentworth’s Dallas office after months of negotiations, which
also occurred in Texas at Barnes-Wentworth’s Dallas office (Barnes-Wentworth
has several major oil production facilities in Texas that are supervised and managed
out of the Dallas field office).
The Agreement was entered into”
in order to” generate a market for BAPCO’s and Barnes-Wentworth’s crude oil
through Ewing Oil’s extensive U.S. distribution and retail channels.
Under the terms of the Agreement, BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth were
supposed to supply crude to Ewing Oil at an agreed discount rate compared with
what the two charged on the open market.
Over time, however, Ewing Oil came to believe that BAPCO and
Barnes-Wentworth were overcharging it for crude oil and demanded repayment
of the excess amounts paid.
When BAPCO and
Barnes-Wentworth refused to issue payment, Ewing Oil brought suit on the contract
against Barnes-Wentworth and BAPCO in Texas federal court, demanding $100
million dollars in damages.
Both defendants were served at their respective headquarters. Assume Texas has a long-arm
statute permitting the exercise of jurisdiction over all parties to contracts
negotiated and/or executed in Texas.
In response to the complaint, BAPCO and Barnes-Wentworth both
filed motions to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction.
How should the court rule?
Write your response in a manner that cited applicable case law and/or
applicable statutes.
An IRAC-style essay would be appropriate for this assignment.
