With so much focus on nuclear verdicts in the trucking industry, a decision last week in a federal appeals court went in a different direction with a significant victory for a major carrier.
Western Express, a privately held truckload carrier with what it says is more than 3,600 power units, has prevailed in an appeals case in the Fourth Circuit involving a 2018 crash in Rockbridge County, Virginia, on Interstate 81 that resulted in “devastating and permanent injuries” to Andre Le Doux, according to a court document.
The Jan. 23 decision from the three-judge panel was unanimous.
The case was considered important enough to impact the body of law that governs trucking negligence that the American Trucking Associations filed an amicus brief in support of Western Express.
In his federal court case in the Western District of Virginia i April 2023, Le Doux lost several of his legal arguments. All of those defeats were affirmed at the appellate level.
A sudden torrential downpour
What made the case complex in assigning negligence is that the agreed-upon conditions surrounding the crash, which involved several other vehicles, was a rainfall that was described in court documents as a “wall of water” that came up quickly.
The question of just how quickly was a key point of dispute in the lawsuit. When the rain hit, according to the appellate court, traffic on Interstate 81 slowed to a stop. “Le Doux braked as he approached stalled traffic,” the appellate court said. “But a vehicle behind him pushed Le Doux’s van into the SUV in front of him. This minor fender-bender forced the vehicle that hit Le Doux into the median, leaving Le Doux’s van the last in line in the left lane.”
Ervin Worthy, driving a Western Express truck, saw the stopped vehicles behind the “wall of water” and immediately braked, shutting off the cruise control that had been in operation and set to 65 miles per hour. That was five miles less than the speed limit, according to the appeals court.
After braking, according to the court decision, “only then did he see the stalled traffic behind
the wall of water. He maneuvered the tractor-trailer into the left lane to avoid vehicles in
the right.”
The attempt to stop did not come in time. “His tractor-trailer smashed into the back of Le Doux’s exposed van,” the appellate court wrote. However, a lower court jury found that Worthy was not negligent in his actions.
Le Doux’s appeal was on several grounds, one of which has long been of particular importance to the trucking industry: how negligent can a trucking company be found regarding the hiring or training of a driver if the company “has conceded that the employee was acting within the scope of his employment,” according to the court’s ruling.
Vicarious liablity is an issue elsewhere too
It’s an important issue in trucking, and in Texas, it’s part of an effort at tort reform.
The district court was correct to dismiss Le Doux’s summary judgment request on a negligent hiring claim, the ATA said, “because Western Express’ stipulation that it was vicariously liable for the tortious acts of Worthy relieved Le Doux of the need to seek another theory of Western Express’s liability for its employee’s wrongful acts.”
It’s a principle that seems backward: admitting a form of liability defends the company from certain actions in a courtroom.
But as the Texas effort shows, and the fact that the ATA amicus brief focuses almost solely on the issue of “vicarious liability,” it is important. The legal concept holds that if an employer concedes that when Western Express said it was “vicariously liable” for the actions of Worthy, further efforts to establish negligence by the carrier have a difficult pathway in the litigation. The admission limits the scope of questioning the negligence of the carrier.
Or as the ATA said, “because Western Express stipulated to the scope of employment, there was no need for Mr. Le Doux to resort to another theory — such as a theory of direct liability for negligent hiring — to impose liability on Western Express for any
wrongful act of Mr. Worthy.”
Pursuing a negligent hiring claim against Western Express after it had made its admission of vicarious liability, the appellate court ruled citing a precedent, “would add elements which if proven at trial would not change the scope of liability but potentially add days of evidence on extraneous topics.”
LeDoux had brought what the court called “a direct theory of liability against Western Express alleging that it negligently hired and retained Worthy despite being aware of a history of misconduct and traffic infractions,” the appeals court said.”
Driver not negligent so carrier can’t be either
But Worthy was not found to be negligent by a jury. And with the vicarious liability finding by the lower court — upheld by the appellate court — closing off Le Doux’s pursuit of a further negligence claim against Western Express, the carrier won that battle.
“There needs to be a causal connection between the hiring of an employee and that employee committing a tortious act that a reasonable employer would have foreseen before hiring him,” the appellate court said of trying to find Western Express was negligent in hiring Worthy.
But Worthy was not found negligent in his actions when confronting the “wall of water.” “If Worthy wasn’t negligent, then (finding that connection) is impossible,” the appellate court wrote. “Because a jury found that Worthy didn’t commit a tort, under Virginia law (Le Doux’) negligent retention claim fails.”
The other parts of Le Doux’s appeal to the Fourth Circuit involved permitting testimony from individuals Le Doux said were expert witnesses on driving conditions and practices. Le Doux also wanted to introduce expert testimony about when the deluge actually began and what sort of weather conditions preceded it.
The district court had excluded testimony from two witnesses supporting Le Doux. The appellate court affirmed the decision to exclude that testimony on various grounds. “The district court didn’t abuse its discretion by excluding the challenged expert testimony,” the appellate court said.
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