Enforcing Foreign Country Money Judgments In Colorado

Foreign Country Money Judgment – Enforcing in Colorado.

A growing number of people are doing business deals throughout the world. A person may obtain a foreign country money judgment against a person with assets located here in Colorado. The secret is knowing how to enforce a foreign country money judgment in Colorado.

There are two Colorado statutes pertaining to a foreign country money judgment. Those statutes are (1) the Uniform Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Act, COLO.REV.STAT. § 13-53-101 et seq. (the “Enforcement Act”) and (2) the Uniform Foreign Money-Judgments Recognition Act, COLO.REV.STAT. § 13-62-101 et seq. (the “Recognition Act”). Now, this gets a little confusing. The short version is that neither statute actually applies, but through something known as comity, Colorado courts use both statutes to recognize a foreign country money judgment.

Under the Enforcement Act a “foreign judgment” typically pertains to foreign judgments of sister states. A sister state would be New York or Arizona. Mexico and Spain are not sister states – they are foreign countries.

To enforce or “domesticate” a foreign judgment of a sister state in Colorado, a copy of the foreign judgment authenticated in accordance with the act of congress or the laws of this state may be filed in the office of the clerk of any court of this state which would have had jurisdiction over the original action had it been commenced first in this state. The Enforcement Act goes on to provide detailed procedures for notice to the judgment debtor and prohibits enforcement of the foreign judgment of a sister state in order to give the judgment debtor time to object. The Enforcement Act also leaves open alternative methods of enforcing a foreign judgment of a sister state.

Under the Recognition Act, a “foreign state” is defined as any governmental unit other than the United States, any state, district, commonwealth, territory, the Panama Canal Zone, the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, or the Ryukyu Islands, which governmental unit has entered into a reciprocal agreement with the United States recognizing any judgment of a court of record of the United States, or any state, district, commonwealth, territory, the Panama Canal Zone, the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, or the Ryukyu Islands, and providing for procedures similar to those contained in the Recognition Act. A “foreign judgment” is defined as any judgment of a foreign state granting or denying recovery of a sum of money, other than a judgment for taxes, a fine or other penalty, or a judgment for support in matrimonial or family matters.

There are a couple of problems with the Recognition Act. First, there are no procedures or time frames set forth in the Recognition Act regarding how to obtain recognition of a foreign country judgment. Second, as noted above in the definition of “foreign state,” for the Recognition Act to come into play, the foreign state must have entered into a reciprocal agreement with the United States. No country has entered into such a reciprocal agreement with the United States. However, the Colorado Court of Appeals has pointed out that these issues do not render the Recognition Act meaningless because a Colorado court may also recognize a foreign country judgment under the common law principals of comity and that the due process requirements of the United States Constitution are satisfied by the procedures of the Enforcement Act.

So, in plain English, what does this mean? It means that even though the Enforcement Act does not apply because this is a foreign country money judgment (i.e., not a sister state money judgment), and even though the Recognition Act does not apply because no foreign country has entered into a reciprocal agreement with the United States, principles of comity do apply. Those principles of comity just so happen to look very much like the Recognition Act + the procedures of the Enforcement Act.

Being able to enforce a foreign country judgment in Colorado is becoming more important as people are able to transfer assets from one country to the next with the flick of a wrist on a keyboard. Knowing how to quickly attach to those assets can be worth thousands of dollars, and in some cases, millions.