Opinion
Civil Action No. 00-3043, Section "L"
October 16, 2001
ORDER AND REASONS
Before the Court is defendant United States' Motion for Summary Judgement. For reasons set forth below, the motion is DENIED.
1. FACTS
Plaintiff Stanley Kirklin was a contract mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service. On October 13, 1997 he bid on a Highway Contract Route 70334 and was awarded the contract for a period beginning January 2, 1998 and ending June 30, 2001. The contract required plaintiff to carry all mail tendered for transportation as well as loading and unloading of the mail. The contract further required that plaintiff provide his own vehicle and pay his operational costs, including ordinary repairs and maintenance of equipment furnished by him, fuel, insurance, and general overhead costs. It is conceded by both parties that plaintiff was an independent contractor for the U.S. Postal Service and not an employee.
Plaintiff alleges that on October 15, 1999, as he was transferring mail to and from his truck while parked at the Houma Post Office loading dock, he was required to lift and move a 140 pound steel ramp from the dock to the base of his truck in the course of which he experienced a sharp pain in his neck and back. The ramp was owned by the U.S. Postal Service and made available to mail carriers for use in transferring mail to and from their vehicles while parked at the Post Office loading dock. It is disputed whether plaintiff was warned by U.S. Postal Service personnel not to lift the steel ramp by himself as well as whether plaintiff requested assistance in lifting the ramp.
Plaintiff seeks damages on the grounds that the U.S. Postal Service was negligent in failing to provide him with one of the lighter, aluminum ramps available for use in transferring mail at the Houma Post Office loading dock. Plaintiff further claims that the U.S. Postal Service was negligent in requiring plaintiff to lift the ramp without assistance.
Defendant moves this Court to dismiss plaintiff's claims on two grounds. First, as a matter of law the U.S. Postal Service owed no duty of safety to its independent contractor. Second, the fact that the Postal Service required plaintiff to use the heavy ramp was not the legal cause of plaintiff's injury because plaintiff's negligence in lifting the ramp supersedes any arguable negligence on the part of the U.S. Postal Service.
II. ANALYSIS
A. Summary Judgment
A district court can grant a motion for summary judgment only when the "`pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.'" Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986) (quoting Fed. P. Civ. P. 56(c)). When considering a motion for summary judgment, the district court "will review the facts drawing all inferences most favorable to the party opposing the motion." Reid v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 784 F.2d 577, 578 (5th Cir. 1986). The court must find "[a] factual dispute . . . [to be] `genuine' if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party . . . [and a] fact . . . [to be] `material' if it might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing substantive law." Beck v. Somerset Techs., Inc., 882 F.2d 993, 996 (5th Cir. 1989) (citing Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986)).
B. Applicable Substantive Law
The Federal Tort Claims Act permits recovery in tort against the United States only "under circumstances where the United States, if a private person, would be liable to the claimant in accordance with the law of the place where the act or omission occurred." 28 U.S.C. § 1346 (b). Because the alleged act or omission arose out of events at the Houma Post Office, the law of Louisiana applies in determining the liability of the U.S. Postal Service. Under Louisiana law, one's liability for negligence is determined according to a Duty/Risk analysis. See Fowler v. Roberts, 556 So.2d 1 (La. 1989). The determination of liability in a negligence case usually requires proof of five separate elements:
(1) proof that the defendant had a duty to conform his conduct to a specific standard (the duty element); (2) proof that the defendant's conduct failed to conform to the appropriate standard (the breach element); (3) proof that the defendant's substandard conduct was a cause-in-fact of the plaintiff's injuries (the cause-in-fact element); (4) proof that the defendant's substandard conduct was a legal cause of the plaintiff's injuries (the scope of liability or scope of protection element); and (5) proof of actual damages (the damages element).
The first element is usually a judge question, and the other four are usually jury questions unless reasonable minds could not differ. Id. at 4-5. See also, Harris v. Pizza Hut of Louisiana, Inc., 455 So.2d 1364, 1371 (La. 1984) (the determination of whether a duty is owed is a question of law). With this framework in mind, the Court considers the grounds on which defendant claims summary judgement is proper.
C. Duty of U.S. Postal Service to its Independent Contractor
Defendant and plaintiff focus primarily on the principal-independent contractor relationship of the parties in this case. Defendant relies on Graham v. Amoco Oil Co., 21 F.3d 643 (5th Cir. 1994) for the notion that under Louisiana law a principal is not liable for the negligent acts of an independent contractor acting pursuant to the contract. See also, Nippa v. Chevron, USA, 774 So.2d 310 (La.App. 4th Cir. 2000), writ denied, 785 So.2d 823 (2001). Graham recognizes two exceptions to this rule: (1) when the suit arises out of the ultra-hazardous activities of its independent contractor, and (2) when the principal retains operational control over the independent contractor's acts or expressly or impliedly authorizes those acts, Graham, 21 F.3d at 645. Plaintiff argues that both of these exception are met in this case.
While the determination of whether a mail carrier is a government employee for purposes of the Federal Tort Claims Act is a matter of federal law, Duncan v. United States, 562 F. Supp. 96, 99 (E.D. La. 1983), the liability of the principal to the independent contractor and the liability of the principal to third parties for the acts or omissions of the independent contractor are determined according to the applicable state law. In this case the parties do not dispute the characterization of plaintiff as an independent contractor.
However, the focus on the principal-independent contractor relationship in this case is misplaced because plaintiff is not a third party seeking damages from the principal for the tortious conduct of an independent contractor. Because a third party is not involved, this is not a case in which the principal's duty is defined by the terms of the contract between the principal and the independent contractor. Cf. Crane v. Exxon Corp., 613 So.2d 214, 221 (La.App. 1st Cir. 1992). There being no categorical rule excluding liability applicable to the facts of this case, the question of whether the Postal Service owed a duty to its independent contractor to guard against the specific risk of harm encountered by the plaintiff in this case — that is, the possible injury due to lifting of a heavy ramp — is committed to the "legal cause" or the "ease of association" inquiry, which involves, at least to some extent, issues of fact and law. See Hill v. Lundin Associates, 256 So.2d 620 (La. 1972).
D. Legal Cause
Secondly, defendant argues that the Postal Service, in requiring the plaintiff to use the heavy ramp, could not be the legal cause of plaintiff's injury because plaintiff's negligence in lifting the entire weight of the ramp, without asking for assistance, superseded any arguable negligence on the part of the Postal Service. Defendant cites Sutton v. Duplesis, 584 So.2d 362 (La.App. 4th Cir. 1991) for the rule that "when an accident results from two acts of negligence, one more remote and one an intervening cause, the presence of the intervening cause prevents a finding of liability on the one responsible for the more remote cause." Id. at 365. However, there is authority holding to the contrary — that a defendant is not necessarily insulated from liability by the intervening negligence of another. The cases are not in conflict, however, when one considers that the determination of whether an intervening cause is a superseding cause involves the question of whether the risk of injury encountered by the plaintiff was within the scope of the risk created by the defendant. See Brow v. Allstate Indem. Co., 771 So.2d 268 (La.App. 1st Cir. 2000) (a risk of a particular injury may not be within the scope of a duty where there is an intervening cause); Cunningham v. Northland Ins. Co., 769 So, 2d 689 (La.App. 5th Cir. 2000) (an intervening cause raises a question of concurrent cause, but if it is determined that the intervening cause is a superseding cause, the defendant is exonerated); Mendaza v. Mashburn, 747 So.2d 1159 (La.App. 5th Cir. 1999) (an initial tortfeasor will not be relieved of the consequences of his negligence unless the intervening cause superseded the original negligence and alone produced the injury). In fact, Louisiana's comparative fault regime implicitly recognizes that both the defendant and another actor may have acted negligently while neither act supersedes the other. See generally, Veazey v. Elmwood Plantation Associates, Ltd., 650 So.2d 712 (La. 1994).
III. CONCLUSION
Because the issue of the defendant's liability in this case is not disposed of by any per se no-duty rule, the defendant's liability turns on questions of fact, in particular, whether the defendant acted reasonably under the circumstances in providing the steel ramp in question for use by its independent contractors. Furthermore, it can not be said definitively at this point in the proceedings, that the defendant's alleged negligence was superseded by the plaintiff's alleged negligence, even though the plaintiff's actions in this case may constitute the greater degree of fault under a comparative negligence analysis. Such issues are pregnant with issues of fact that are in dispute in this case. Therefore, the issue of defendant's liability in this case is not ripe for resolution on summary judgment. For these reasons, the defendant's motion is hereby DENIED.