Art. 73.Action Against Joint Or Solidary Obligors

When more than one person or entity can be held liable on the same obligation, Louisiana law often describes them as "solidary obligors." This is the civil-law term for what common-law states usually call joint and several liability: each solidary obligor can be held responsible for the whole debt, and the creditor can demand full payment from any one of them, leaving that obligor to seek contribution from the others.

Article 73(A) lets a plaintiff suing joint or solidary obligors together bring the case in any parish that is a proper venue, under the general rule of Article 42, as to any one of the defendants — there is no need to find a parish proper as to every defendant. Tort claims get one added path: if the plaintiff's own domicile parish would be a proper venue against any defendant under Article 76 (the insurance-venue article) or under the state's long-arm statute for nonresident defendants, the plaintiff may sue there instead.

Subsection B protects that venue choice from being undone after the fact. If the case against the defendant whose presence justified the chosen parish is settled before judgment, or dismissed after a trial on the merits, venue remains proper as to the remaining defendants. The one exception closes an obvious loophole: if that defendant was joined solely to manufacture venue against the others, the protection does not apply, and the plaintiff cannot rely on a defendant added in bad faith to anchor a case in an otherwise improper parish.