Rx & The Law

Jurisdiction

by Don R. McGuire, Jr., R.Ph., J.D.
General Counsel
Pharmacists Mutual Insurance Company

Because the United States has many different court systems, the law applied to your case can have a dramatic impact on the outcome.  One important factor in any legal dispute is the jurisdiction.  But what does that mean?  Jurisdiction is defined as the power to hear and determine a case.   Courts can have general jurisdiction or limited jurisdiction. 

General jurisdiction courts can hear and decide almost all types of cases.  An example would be the district or superior court in your county.  In a typical situation where a pharmacist is sued by a patient, this would be the forum where the case would be heard.  However, there are other situations where this would not be true.

Pharmacies that do a significant amount of business out of state and have registered as a non-resident pharmacy with that state’s board of pharmacy are probably subject to the jurisdiction of that state’s courts.  Long Arm Statutes have been enacted in most states.  These laws allow local courts to have jurisdiction over non-resident defendants in certain circumstances.  If an error occurs on a prescription sent to another state and the patient is harmed, the pharmacy could have to defend the case in that patient’s locale.  This can be inconvenient and expensive for the pharmacy, but it is a potential price the pharmacy would pay for doing business in that state.

Pharmacists could also end up in another state’s court due to a contract which they signed.  Parties to a contract may agree to a particular jurisdiction in the contract.  Then in the event of a breach of that contract, the parties do not have to contest the proper jurisdiction because it has been agreed upon in advance.  Pharmacies may enter into contracts with many different vendors, each of which may stipulate to a different jurisdiction.  This could result in the pharmacy defending a breach of contract claim in a far away state.

Courts of limited jurisdiction are limited to hearing only certain subject matters.  Examples of these would be a small claims court or a probate court.  Patients could bring cases against their pharmacist in small claims court, but their ultimate recovery would be limited by the jurisdictional limit of the small claims court.

Interestingly, Federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction.  The structure of the Federal court system parallels the structure of most state court systems.  While the trial courts in state systems are courts of general jurisdiction, the Federal trial courts are not.  Federal court jurisdiction is limited to two types of cases.  Federal Question jurisdiction consists of cases involving disputes arising under the U.S. Constitution or the laws and treaties of the United States.  The other Federal jurisdiction is Diversity jurisdiction.  This occurs when the opposing parties come from different states.  Therefore, it is possible that the case described above where the pharmacist sent prescriptions out of state could be brought in Federal court if the jurisdictional amount was met.  Diversity jurisdiction requires the amount in controversy to exceed $75,000.  Smaller cases will be relegated to the state courts even though the opponents are from different states.

In either a general or a limited jurisdictional court, the court must have both subject matter and personal jurisdiction.  That is, the court must have jurisdiction over both the subject of the case and over the parties involved.  Most often, courts of limited jurisdiction are limited because of the subject matter of the case.  A court’s jurisdiction over a person results from the person’s physical presence in the state, but jurisdiction over a person can be expanded by the Long Arm Statutes previously mentioned.    

If a party feels that the court doesn’t have the power to hear and decide the case, the party should file a motion asserting the lack of personal or subject matter jurisdiction (or both) with the court.  The judge can also rule on the subject of jurisdiction on their own initiative.  If a court does not have jurisdiction, then the judge should dismiss the case from that court’s docket.  However, the plaintiff is then free to file the case in the proper court.  A court without jurisdiction over a case cannot issue a valid decision in that case.  Any judgment issued by a court without proper jurisdiction is void.

Barron’s Law Dictionary Second Edition; 1984; edited by Steven H. Gifis