Page "Alien Tort Statute" Paragraph 22

On August 11, 2009, the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued a decision in Sinaltrainal v. Coca-Cola Company.

In this case, plaintiffs alleged that Coca-Cola bottlers in Colombia collaborated with Colombian paramilitary forces in " the systematic intimidation, kidnapping, detention, torture, and murder of Colombian trade unionists.

" However, the district court dismissed the complaint and the Eleventh Circuit upheld that ruling.

In doing so, the Eleventh Circuit relied upon the Supreme Court's recent Ashcroft v. Iqbal decision in addressing the adequacy of the complaint, which has must have " facial plausibility " to survive dismissal, and noted that Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure demands " more than an unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.

" The Eleventh Circuit then applied the Iqbal standard to plaintiffs ' allegations against Coca-Cola and held that they were insufficient to survive dismissal.