15 Fla. L. Weekly Supp. 850a
Insurance — Personal injury protection — Venue — Forum non conveniens — Insurer’s motion to transfer venue based on forum non conveniens is denied where insurer has failed to identify potential witnesses
HIGH DEFINITION MOBILE MRI, INC., a Florida Corporation (assignee of Zephir, Monique), Plaintiff, v. DIRECT GENERAL INSURANCE COMPANY, Defendant. County Court, 17th Judicial Circuit in and for Broward County. Case No. 07-007834 COSO 61. June 4, 2008. Arlene J. Simon, Judge. Counsel: Jonathan J. Warrick, Law Office of Russel Lazega, P.A., North Miami, for Plaintiff. Julie Terry, for Defendant.
ORDER DENYING DEFENDANT’S MOTION TO TRANSFER VENUE/MOTION TO DISMISS
THIS CAUSE came before the Court at hearing on January 23, 2008 on Defendant’s Motion to Transfer Venue/Motion to Dismiss, and the Court’s having reviewed the Motion and entire Court file; reviewed the relevant legal authorities; heard argument, and been sufficiently advised in the premises the Court finds as follows:
Background:This is a multi-count P.I.P. case. Defendant has moved to transfer venue based on forum non convenience, alleging the most proper venue for the Plaintiff’s action is in Orange or Hillsborough County. Plaintiff maintains that Defendant fails to demonstrate the nature and quality of the testimony of the witnesses Defendant states will be inconvenienced if the action were to continue in Broward County.
Conclusions of Law. It is well-settled in Florida that a Plaintiff’s choice of venue carries a presumption of correctness and the Defendant bears the burden of proving that venue is improper or a trial in the county in which the action was filed would present a substantial inconvenience to it and the witnesses. See Intercapital Funding Corp. v. Gisclair, 683 So. 2d 530 (Fla. 4th DCA, 1996).
Further, “[i]n order for a court to consider the convenience of the witnesses, the court must know who the witnesses are and the significance of their testimony”. Hu v. Crockett, 426 So. 2d 1275 (Fla. 1st DCA, 1983). Here, Defendant fails to even identify to the Court the potential witnesses in this action. “The court would need this information to ascertain whether a particular witness’ testimony is material. Second, the court might desire to have this information in an effort to locate the trial in a forum most convenient to the greatest number of key witnesses, since the quality of testimony by a key witness may well outweigh the quantity of testimony by a number of witnesses testifying to relatively unimportant matters”. R.C. Storage One, Inc. v. Strand Realty, Inc., 714 So. 2d 634 (Fla. 4th DCA, 1998).
In consideration of the above, it is hereby,
ORDERED AND ADJUDGED that the Defendant’s Motion to Transfer Venue/Motion to Dismiss is hereby DENIED.
