Rubin v. Islamic Republic of Iran
U.S. Supreme Court · decided February 21, 2018 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Decided
- February 21, 2018
- Term
- October Term 2017
- Vote
- 8–0
- Majority author
- Justice Sotomayor
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice SOTOMAYOR delivered the opinion of the Court. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) grants foreign states and their agencies and instrumentalities immunity from suit in the United States (called jurisdictional immunity) and grants their property immunity from attachment and execution in satisfaction of judgments against them. See 28 U.S.C. §§ 1604, 1609. But those grants of immunity are subject to exception. Petitioners hold a judgment against respondent Islamic Republic of Iran pursuant to one such exception to jurisdictional immunity, which applies where the foreign state is designated as a state sponsor of terrorism and the claims arise out of acts of terrorism. See § 1605A. The issue presented in this case is whether certain property of Iran, specifically, a collection of antiquities owned by Iran but in the possession of respondent University of Chicago, is subject to attachment and execution by petitioners in satisfaction of that judgment. Petitioners contend that the property is stripped of its immunity by another provision of the FSIA, § 1610(g), which they maintain provides a blanket exception to the immunity typically afforded to the property of a foreign state where the party seeking to attach and execute holds a § 1605A judgment. We disagree. Section 1610(g) serves to identify property that will be available for attachment and execution in…
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