in this video we will introduce longarm personal jurisdiction as applied in the United States when we say personal jurisdiction we mean power over a person specifically we mean a Court's power over a person if a court lacks personal jurisdiction then the court has no power over the party when a court has person jurisdiction over a person the court can issue a decision against that person and when we say a person we mean a natural person like a human being but also a company a business let's take as an example the state of New York New York is a large state with four United States district courts of course New York also has state courts and you can find these courts throughout the state New York also has borders and borders are relevant to the issue of personal jurisdiction so let's assume we have a case in New York and the case is in New York federal court we'll say that David is the defendant and Patty is the plaintiff suing David in federal court now let's say David our defendant is a resident of New York York he lives in New York state it probably does not surprise you that a New York Court has power over David A New York Court will have personal jurisdiction over David just based on his residence but what if David is not a resident of New York what if David is a resident of New Jersey does a New York Court still have power over David can a New York Court assert personal jurisdiction over David and of course this is also a question if David were a citizen of a different country so what happens if New York does not have personal jurisdiction over David if a New York Court does not have personal jurisdiction over David then Patty can't sue him in New York she would have to sue in a different state that has personal jurisdiction over David sometimes in the United States a court in one state will assert personal jurisdiction over a defendant who resides in a different state when a court asserts personal jurisdiction over an outof State party we call it longarm personal jurisdiction New York might be able to Asser assert longarm personal jurisdiction over David if a court asserts longarm personal jurisdiction even an outof State defendant like David will have to defend himself in court if you'd like to discuss personal jurisdiction or any other matter related to US law stop by The Message Board also please visit my blog and feel free to send me an email to submit your comments below