Regarding rights -- I'm not an authority on the subject, but from what I know, in the USA, non-citizens have the same rights as citizens at least in regard to certain matters such as civil law, etc. (on the other hand, non-citizens don't have the right to vote, they don't have the right to enter the country and/or stay in the country whenever, and for however long they want to etc., for obvious reasons).
Getting to the subject at hand, a non-citizen -- let's say somebody from Europe -- has exactly the same rights in the USA as a USA citizen in regard to seeking a remedy at law with respect to a business transaction.
However, the real issue here is "jurisdiction." From the facts of the matter as I understand them, jurisdiction would be in the state of North Carolina or at the very least somewhere in the USA. This is because Cor essentially went to the Emmons company and offered to purchase a product.
As an illustration of the contrary case, if the guitar had been purchased from an Emmons representative in Europe, or maybe in response to an advertisement which offered to sell guitars and which ad was published in Europe, then the jurisdiction would quite possibly lay in Europe.
Similarly, if a US citizen contacted a European company directly, and placed an order for a product to be built and shipped to the USA, and then had problems such as those alleged here, then that US citizen could not seek legal remedies through a US court because jurisdiction for the matter would lay in the European courts.
So, in this case, it's ALMOST certain that the jurisdiction is in the USA and more specifically in NC.
That means that in order to seek legal remedies against Emmons, Cor has to do so through the NC courts.
I'm not familiar with the NC court system, and I don't think anyone has suggested this, but could it be possible that Cor could go through a small claims court. Most states have such courts and there are limits on the amount of damages sought etc., but the costs are much less. Also, it's possible that somebody could represent Cor on his behalf due to the fact of the distances involved.
Also, maybe somebody could, on Cor's behalf, contact a legal clinic such as one operated through a law school (there are 5 law schools in NC, last time I checked), which typically take cases for free in circumstances where the client is in a difficult situation or cannot pay etc.
Just a few thoughts.
