I'll go along with that "overly litigious society" comment. You know if you're injured because of someone else's carelessness, sure, your medical expenses and rehab, if necessary should be covered. Income lost? Sure. But 10 million dollars for pain and suffering? I don't think so. But my husband, a lawyer, likes to point out, that, yes the lawyers ask for the money, but it's the JURIES, who award it. A jury can say, okay, the plaintiff wants 10 million dollars, but we think five thousand is plenty. You won't find too many lawyers lining up for a third of five thousand bucks. It's time to rein in the JURIES.
Why does our government pay survivor benefits? By your reasoning, our schools could hire teachers that are on the sex offenders registry. The school would not need to be held accountable.
Really Dave? That's the connection you make? Instead of coming back with the absurd, try a little common sense.
Lol. My point exactly. It's absurd to think that employers could ever be absolved of all liability from actions of their employees. There would be no limit to the absurdity. So you think the school has some responsibility to provide a safe learning environment? Apparently you do if my example is absurd to you. If I own a trucking firm, do I not owe you the same concern for safety on a public road? Or, should I hire the first guy in the door that can reach the gas pedal? If not, why not?
In the the case of the police officer killing people, we should assume he had a clean bill of health and the employer hired that officer correctly. Yet, even though the department was thorough, they are held liable and expected to pay out simply because he was in their payroll. That is absurd Don't know the facts of this case but it seems to be no different. I'm sure the guy had a good driving record, and the company didn't know he had driven 12 hours to get put on to drive another 13. Yet because he was under wal mart employment, they are going after wal mart even though wal mart most likely didn't have much to do with it, he was simply on their payroll.
I agree with you 100% that you don't know the facts of the case. Therefore you have no way of knowing if he had a good driving record or not. And you don't know what the company knew. However, I say again, however, there is a phrase in the law which is used to assign responsibility. The phrase is "Knew Or Should Have Known."
It's called playing hypothetical, that's why I said I didn't know. I'm aware of that phrase and the interpretation of it gets ridiculous at times.
Do you have control over your employees when they are not in the office? An employee at your wife's cell phone store walks out of the store during her work hours, walks into the US Bank branch halfway down the block to get change and decides to rob the place. During the robbery she shoots and kills a teller, how quick are you and your wife going to jump up and start handing out cash? You aren't and you know it. The only difference, your employee made a bad decision and used a gun to kill and the driver used a tractor trailer to do the same job. Both were motivated by cash, both made a decision that cost someone their life, and both were representing their employer where the employer did not have direct supervision over them.
Again, there is no way to draw that fine line that would ever absolve employers of all liability from their employees actions. On or off premise. Unfortunately, the umbrella does cover some actions that should not be recoverable. But, it also provides a level of civility that we would not get with an open gate.
I wish people would not post silly scenarios in order to try to make a point. The rule is "IN THE SCOPE OF HIS EMPLOYMENT." Is robbing a bank in the scope of your employment? Of course not. Think man, think. Just because you're on company time and running an errand for your employer doesn't make the employer responsible if what you do is not in the scope of your employment. Okay?
Him deciding to make the 700 mile drive directly before starting work was not in the scope of his employment either. He made a bad choice and someone died because of HIS choice, not his employer's. Therefore the comparison is appropriate.
and the fact that he did not have 10 hours rest before starting to work that day made him in violation of the federal law long before his semi ever left the warehouse dock.
