Hi Hotel HCF SARL v Uwe Spoering.

• Jurisdiction: European Union
• Celex Number: 62012CJ0387
• ECLI: ECLI:EU:C:2014:215
• Date: 03 April 2014
• Court: Court of Justice (European Union)
• Procedure Type: Reference for a preliminary ruling
• Docket Number: C‑387/12

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT (Fourth Chamber)

3 April 2014 (*1 )

‛Judicial cooperation in civil matters — Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 — International jurisdiction in matters relating to tort, delict or quasi-delict — Act committed in one Member State consisting in participation in an act of tort or delict committed in another Member State — Determination of the place where the harmful event occurred’

In Case C‑387/12,

REQUEST for a preliminary ruling under Article 267 TFEU from the Bundesgerichtshof (Germany), made by decision of 28 June 2012, received at the Court on 15 August 2012, in the proceedings

Hi Hotel HCF SARL

v

Uwe Spoering,

THE COURT (Fourth Chamber),

composed of L. Bay Larsen, President of the Chamber, M. Safjan (Rapporteur), C.G. Fernlund, J. Malenovský and A. Prechal, Judges,

Advocate General: N. Jääskinen,

Registrar: A. Impellizzeri, Administrator,

having regard to the written procedure and further to the hearing on 5 September 2013,

after considering the observations submitted on behalf of:

— Hi Hotel HCF SARL, by H. Leis, Rechtsanwalt,

— Mr Spoering, by P. Ruppert, Rechtsanwalt,

— the German Government, by T. Henze and F. Wannek, acting as Agents,

— the United Kingdom Government, by A. Robinson, acting as Agent,

— the European Commission, by W. Bogensberger and M. Wilderspin, acting as Agents,

having decided, after hearing the Advocate General, to proceed to judgment without an Opinion,

gives the following

Judgment

1 This request for a preliminary ruling concerns the interpretation of Article 5(3) of Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (OJ 2001 L 12, p. 1).

2 The request has been made in proceedings between Hi Hotel HCF SARL (‘Hi Hotel’), established in Nice (France), and Mr Spoering, residing in Cologne (Germany), concerning a claim for an order to cease an infringement of copyright and for compensation.

Legal context

3 According to recital 2 in the preamble to Regulation No 44/2001, the regulation is intended, in the interests of the sound operation of the internal market, to implement ‘[p]rovisions to unify the rules of conflict of jurisdiction in civil and commercial matters and to simplify the formalities with a view to rapid and simple recognition and enforcement of judgments from Member States bound by this Regulation’.

4 Recitals 11, 12 and 15 in the preamble to that regulation state: ‘(11) The rules of jurisdiction must be highly predictable and founded on the principle that jurisdiction is generally based on the defendant’s domicile and jurisdiction must always be available on this ground save in a few well-defined situations in which the subject-matter of the litigation or the autonomy of the parties warrants a different linking factor. The domicile of a legal person must be defined autonomously so as to make the common rules more transparent and avoid conflicts of jurisdiction. (12) In addition to the defendant’s domicile, there should be alternative grounds of jurisdiction based on a close link between the court and the action or in order to facilitate the sound administration of justice. … (15) In the interests of the harmonious administration of justice it is necessary to minimise the possibility of concurrent proceedings and to ensure that irreconcilable judgments will not be given in two Member States. …’

5 The rules on jurisdiction appear in Chapter II, ‘Jurisdiction’, of Regulation No 44/2001.

6 Article 2(1) of that regulation, which is in Chapter II, Section 1, ‘General provisions’, provides: ‘Subject to this Regulation, persons domiciled in a Member State shall, whatever their nationality, be sued in the courts of that Member State.’

7 Article 3(1), which is also in Chapter II, Section 1, of the regulation, provides: ‘Persons domiciled in a Member State may be sued in the courts of another Member State only by virtue of the rules set out in Sections 2 to 7 of this Chapter.’

8 Article 5(3) of the regulation, which forms part of Chapter II, Section 2, ‘Special jurisdiction’, provides: ‘A person domiciled in a Member State may, in another Member State, be sued: … 3. in matters relating to tort, delict or quasi-delict, in the courts for the place where the harmful event occurred or may occur.’

The dispute in the main proceedings and the question referred for a preliminary ruling

9 According to the order for reference, Mr Spoering is a photographer who in February 2003, on behalf of Hi Hotel, took 25 transparencies of interior views of various rooms in the hotel run by that company in Nice. Mr Spoering granted Hi Hotel the right to use the photographs in advertising brochures and on its website. There was no written agreement on the rights of use. Hi Hotel paid the invoice for the photographs, in the amount of EUR 2 500, which contained the note ‘include the rights — only for the hotel hi’.

10 In 2008 Mr Spoering noticed in a bookshop in Cologne an illustrated book with the title ‘Innenarchitektur weltweit’ (‘Interior Architecture Worldwide’), published by Phaidon-Verlag of Berlin (Germany), containing reproductions of nine of the photographs he had taken of the interior of the hotel in Nice run by Hi Hotel.

11 Since he considered that Hi Hotel had infringed his copyright in the photographs by passing them on to a third party, namely Phaidon-Verlag, Mr Spoering brought proceedings against Hi Hotel in Cologne. He sought inter alia an order that Hi Hotel should cease reproducing or causing to be reproduced, distributing or causing to be distributed or exhibiting or causing to be exhibited within the Federal Republic of Germany, without his prior consent, the photographs mentioned in the preceding paragraph (claim for a prohibitory order), and should pay compensation for all damage which he had sustained or would sustain as a result of the conduct of Hi Hotel.

12 The order for reference states that Hi Hotel submitted that Phaidon-Verlag also has a place of business in Paris (France) and that the manager of Hi Hotel could have made the photographs in question available to that publisher. Hi Hotel stated that it did not know whether the publisher had then passed them on to its German sister company.

13 The court of first instance allowed Mr Spoering’s claim, and the appeal by Hi Hotel was unsuccessful. The Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Court of Justice), before which Hi Hotel brought an appeal on a point of law, is uncertain as to whether international jurisdiction of the German courts may be established on the basis of Article 5(3) of Regulation No 44/2001.

14 The Bundesgerichtshof observes that, in view of the submissions of Hi Hotel summarised in paragraph 12 above, which have not been contradicted by Mr Spoering, the international jurisdiction of the German courts under Article 5(3) of Regulation No 44/2001 must be examined on the basis of the assumption that Phaidon-Verlag of Berlin distributed the photographs in question in Germany in breach of copyright and that Hi Hotel assisted it in so doing by handing them over to Phaidon-Verlag of Paris.

15 In those circumstances the Bundesgerichtshof decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following question to the Court for a preliminary ruling: ‘Is Article 5(3) of Regulation … No 44/2001 to be interpreted as meaning that the harmful event occurred in one Member State (Member State A) if the tort or delict which forms the subject-matter of the proceedings or from which claims are derived was committed in another Member...