Opinion ID: 1174364
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: negligence in selection

Text: Petitioner's first contention is that the trial court correctly held that there was insufficient evidence to hold it liable for negligence in selecting S.T.O.P. to perform the pipe salvage work. We do not agree and hold that this issue should have been submitted to the jury for determination. This court has not previously been confronted with the problem of determining the extent of a person's duty to choose a competent independent contractor. As a general rule, the employer has a duty to use reasonable care to choose a contractor who is properly qualified to perform the work. 41 Am.Jur.2d Independent Contractors § 26. One legal commentator has written: The rule has been widely adopted that an employer of an independent contractor may be liable to one injured as a result of the contractor's fault where it is shown that the employer was negligent in selecting a careless or incompetent person with whom to contract. Annot., 8 A.L.R.2d 267 § 1. Courts across the country have uniformly adopted this rule. E. g., Ozan Lumber Co. v. McNeely, 214 Ark. 657, 217 S.W.2d 341, 8 A.L.R.2d 261; Joslin v. Idaho Times Publishing Co., 60 Idaho 235, 91 P.2d 386; American Coated Fabrics Co. v. Berkshire Apparel Corp., 361 Mass. 165, 279 N.E.2d 695; Annot., 44 A.L.R. 932 § 14. In addition to the duty to carefully select a properly qualified contractor, if the activity is potentially dangerous the employer also has a duty to explore the contractor's fitness and ability to operate safely. Joslin v. Idaho Times Publishing Co., supra . The Second Restatement of Torts has appropriately summarized this duty by stating that the employer must choose    a contractor who possesses the knowledge, skill, experience, and available equipment which a reasonable man would realize that a contractor must have in order to do the work which he is employed to do without creating unreasonable risk of injury to others   . Restatement (Second) of Torts § 411 (Comment a). Implicit in this duty is the requirement that sufficient inquiries must be made concerning the contractor's ability to do the work in a competent and careful manner. See Annot., 8 A.L.R.2d 267 § 5. [1] This duty to carefully select an independent contractor extends to third parties who are within the zone of foreseeable risk. A tenant of a building is certainly within the class of persons protected when his landlord negligently employs an independent contractor to perform work upon that building. The landlord-tenant relationship as such, however, is not the basis for our holding on this claim. [2] To recover, it must be shown that the employer's negligence was the proximate cause of the injury to the third person. More specifically, it must be demonstrated that the harm resulted from some quality in the contractor which made it negligent for the employer to entrust the work to him. Restatement (Second) of Torts § 411 (Comment b). Further, we hold that recovery may be had for damage to the tenant's property and for incidental and consequential damages. In the present case, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the party against whom the motion for directed verdict was made, Romero v. Denver and Rio Grande Western Ry. Co., 183 Colo. 32, 514 P.2d 626, it appears that the landlord made no check of the competency or carefulness of the independent contractor before employing it. In addition, there is evidence to support the contention that the landlord knew that an electric cutting torch was to be used and that the walls of the building consisted of wood and cork permeated with grease. On inquiry, Western could have readily discovered that S.T.O.P. was not experienced in doing this kind of work with an electric cutting torch. These facts certainly presented a prima facie case and required the trial court to submit to the jury the issue of Western's prudence in selecting S.T.O.P. to do the pipe salvage work.