Opinion
No. 559315
June 24, 2003
MEMORANDUM OF DECISION
I. PROCEDURE
In this vigorously disputed matter the plaintiff, Fred E. Jones, (hereinafter plaintiff or Jones) filed this action in July 2001 against both Harry's Taxi, Inc. (hereinafter Harry's Taxi or defendant) and Giampiero Raschello to recover for injuries alleged to have been caused by Raschello. In January 2003 the case was withdrawn against Raschello and, after various pleadings by the parties, proceeded to trial against Harry's Taxi only before this court on May 29, 2003. The parties presented witnesses and exhibits and thereafter filed comprehensive briefs in support of their positions. Each party was ably represented by competent counsel.
The plaintiff pled two separate counts in his complaint, but presented evidence only as to the first count, i.e., that the defendant is liable for the injuries allegedly caused by its employee Raschello under the doctrine of respondeat superior. No evidence was presented on the second count, which the court deems to have been abandoned.
At the time of the trial both parties filed a joint motion requesting the court to bifurcate the trial and proceed on the issue of liability only on the theory of conserving judicial resources. The motion was granted.
II. FINDING OF FACTS
Most of the facts of this case are undisputed. From the evidence produced by the parties at the trial, including the court's evaluation of the credibility of the witnesses, and reasonable inferences following logically from the facts found, the court makes the following finding of facts. Commencing in approximately 1987-88 the plaintiff Fred E. Jones became a driver for the defendant Harry's Taxi, Inc. It was agreed for the purposes of the trial that Mr. Jones' relationship to the defendant CT Page 7389-r was that of an independent contractor because, along with other drivers, he would lease cabs from the defendant, drive them, and pay to the defendant a fixed lease amount under the terms of a written Automobile Lease Agreement (Exhibit D-3). The dispatcher for Harry's Taxi, Inc., Raschello, unlike the taxi drivers, was an employee of the defendant, and was responsible for assigning to the drivers a particular cab from the fleet maintained by the defendant and taking telephone requests for taxicabs and assigning them by radio to particular drivers on duty at the time.
The dispatcher operated out of an office on the premises of Harry's Taxi that was separate and distinct from the garage and the area where the taxi drivers were allowed to wait. John Knowles, President and ninety-nine percent owner of the defendant, testified that this separate office was built at a cost of $10,000.00 for the purpose of keeping the taxi drivers away from the dispatcher. Before there was a separate office for the dispatcher there had been difficulty with drivers or those awaiting assignment of cabs milling around and distracting the dispatcher. Defendant's Exhibits 1 and 2 (a building plan and photographs) demonstrated the desire of the owner of Harry's Taxi to keep the drivers away from the dispatcher. There was no door provided to the dispatcher's area from the room provided for the drivers awaiting assignment of a taxi. A small window was installed through which the dispatcher could hand the keys to the driver without the driver entering the dispatcher's office, and there were numerous posted signs forbidding drivers to enter the dispatch office demonstrating the overriding purpose of management to keep drivers out of the dispatcher's office. It was clear that the dispatcher's office was to be a "restricted area." There was, however, a door from the mechanic's area into the dispatcher's office without a separate window at that location.
On July 12, 1999 the dispatcher employed by the defendant was Giampiero Raschello. Mr. Jones arrived at approximately 1:45 p.m. that day and was instructed by Mr. Raschello that he had to wait fifteen minutes, until 2:00 p.m., before he could get the keys to his assigned cab. Mr. Jones waited until 2:00 p.m., outside the Dispatch Office, in the area designated for drivers and at 2:00 p.m. returned to the window and was handed keys with the direction that the cab was down "in back." The area "in back" was a parking lot behind the separate area for the mechanics which could be reached by going out the front door and around the building or by going through the mechanics area within the building. There were approximately eight to nine taxicabs in back and when he arrived, he noticed that, contrary to standard practice, the license plate number was not stamped on the key he had been given by the dispatcher. To remedy that situation he attempted to unlock each taxi in CT Page 7389-s the lot with the key provided, but it did not fit any of the taxicabs there.
As Mr. Jones was returning from the back lot to the office he met a mechanic employed by the defendant whom he knew as Russ, who asked him what was wrong and if the keys didn't fit. Russ directed him to go into the office and get the keys. (No claim is made by the plaintiff that Russ had authority to waive the employer's policy against drivers in the dispatch office.)
Mr. Jones, going through the mechanic's area, thereupon knocked on the door to the dispatch office. He received no response so he opened the door and went in even though he was aware that it was the policy of the defendant to keep drivers out the that dispatcher's office. The dispatcher, Mr. Raschello, was in the office with a woman unknown to Mr. Jones. Mr. Jones went inside the office and told him the keys did not fit any of the cabs "in back" and that the mechanic said he should go to the office and get the right keys.
At that point Mr. Raschello stood up and screamed "GET OUT OF THE OFFICE" and proceeded repeatedly to shove the plaintiff back around the office, toward the door where he first came in. Raschello then reached for a shovel, threatened to strike him in the head, and struck the shovel against a counter a number of times apparently in an unsuccessful attempt to break off the blade portion, injuring his own hand in the process. Raschello then proceeded to attempt to stab at the plaintiff's stomach with the shovel. The plaintiff blocked the shovel and Raschello started punching him in the head, knocking him to the floor onto a pile of car parts. The plaintiff crawled away, went home, called 911 and after reporting the incident to the police, went for medical treatment.
This trial has been bifurcated and only the issue of liability was presented to the court.
III. CONCLUSIONS OF LAW AND DECISION
A. AN EMPLOYER IS LIABLE FOR TORTS COMMITTED BY ITS EMPLOYEE IN FURTHERANCE OF THE EMPLOYER'S INSTRUCTIONS, EVEN IF THE EMPLOYEE'S METHOD OF CARRYING OUT THE EMPLOYER'S POLICY IS WHOLLY UNAUTHORIZED OR FORBIDDEN.
Son v. Hartford Ice Cream Company, 102 Conn. 696, 129 A. 778 (1925). Rappaport v. Rosen Film Delivery System, Inc., 127 Conn. 524, 527, 18 A.2d 362 (1941). In a case the court finds to be similar to the case presented by the above facts, Pelletier v. Bilbiles, 154 Conn. 544, CT Page 7389-t 227 A.2d 251 (1967), the defendant's employee (his son William, age 19) had been instructed by the defendant "neither to permit horseplay on the premises nor to allow anything be thrown around inside the store." Id. at 546. When the sixteen-year-old plaintiff blew the paper sheath off a straw onto the floor, the employee's temper "began to flare," and he escorted the plaintiff outside of the store. At a point approximately fifty feet away from the store he commenced severely to batter that plaintiff. The trial court had set aside a judgment in favor of the plaintiff against the defendant on grounds that the battery occurred outside of the store, [the Spa Confectionary] but the Supreme Court, citing Son v. Hartford Ice Cream Co., supra, reversed and remanded with direction to enter judgment for the plaintiff against the defendant employer:
The beating of an unruly customer, if the plaintiff can be so characterized, is an extremely forceful, although misguided, method of discouraging patrons of the Spa, including the plaintiff, from causing disturbances on the premises in the future. The fact that the specific method the servant employs to accomplish his master's order is not authorized does not relieve the master from liability . . . Also, the fact that the battery by William may have been motivated by personal animosity as well as an overzealous regard for his duties as an employee does not exonerate the defendant. Restatement (Second), 1 Agency section 236, Illust. 1. A master does not escape liability merely because a servant loses his temper while he is conducting the master's business.
Pelletier v. Bilbiles, 154 Conn. 544, 548, 227 A.2d 251 (1967). The court further observed that the jury "could reasonably have concluded, on the basis of the evidence, that William's loss of temper and the subsequent battery were the immediate and proximate results of William's attempts to carry out the defendant's instructions not to permit mischief on the premises. As such, the battery was merely the culmination of a transaction related directly to William's duties, and the defendant could properly be found liable." Id. at 548-49.
The defendant's attempt to distinguish this case are not availing. Here the court finds that the dispatcher was attempting to enforce the clear and unambiguous purpose of the defendant to keep drivers out of the dispatcher's separate office space (which had specifically been designed and built by the defendant at considerable expense for that purpose) when he took the action he took. The fact that the defendant may not have CT Page 7389-u specifically authorized the method employed by the dispatcher or that he may have lost his temper in the process has been found by our Supreme Court not to be controlling.
The court finds the issues in favor of the plaintiff on liability and enters judgment accordingly without costs to either party.
Robert C. Leuba, JTR CT Page 7389-v