Bewers v. American Home Products Corp.

American Home Products Corporation (AHP) (defendant) was a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in New York. Wyeth Laboratories, Inc. (Wyeth) (defendant) was AHP’s wholly owned subsidiary. Wyeth was incorporated in New York and had its principal place of business in Pennsylvania. AHP held the licenses for two female oral contraceptives known as Ovran and Ovranette (contraceptives). Gwendoline Bewers and other users of the contraceptives in the United Kingdom (collectively, women) (collectively, plaintiffs) sued AHP, Wyeth, and an unincorporated AHP division in New York state court, alleging that AHP and Wyeth were liable to the women under negligence, breach-of-warranty, strict-liability, and fraud theories because the contraceptives caused the women to suffer severe strokes. AHP and Wyeth moved to dismiss the complaint on forum non conveniens grounds pursuant to Civil Practice Law and Rules § 327. Per AHP and Wyeth, the United Kingdom was a more appropriate forum because the contraceptives were prescribed, purchased, and taken in the United Kingdom and were manufactured, tested, labelled, and distributed in the United Kingdom by an English company that was AHP’s licensee in the United Kingdom. The women responded that AHP and Wyeth committed the actual wrongs against them in New York because, while in New York, AHP and Wyeth decided to promote, market, sell, and distribute the contraceptives in the United Kingdom without adequately warning the women about the contraceptives’ dangers. The women further argued that the United Kingdom was not a reasonable forum because the United Kingdom did not recognize strict-liability claims, which the women asserted was their strongest theory of recovery; also, the women would not have the rights to a jury trial and significant pretrial discovery in the United Kingdom, as they would in New York. The supreme court denied AHP and Wyeth’s motion to dismiss on the grounds of justice, fairness, and convenience. AHP and Wyeth appealed.