Opinion ID: 13423
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Turning Aside from the Employer's Business

Text: 30 However, the employer's broad liability is limited in that an employee who detours from the employer's business is not acting within the scope of employment. In Texas,  'when the servant turns aside, for however short a time, from the prosecution of the master's work to engage in an affair wholly his own, he ceases to act for the master, and the responsibility for that which he does in pursuing his own business or pleasure is upon him alone.'  Hagenloh, 247 S.W.2d at 241 (quoting Galveston, H. & S.A. Ry. Co. v. Currie, 100 Tex. 136, 96 S.W. 1073, 1074 (1906)); see also 1 TEXAS TORTS AND REMEDIES, supra, § 4.02[c]. No liability extends to the employer when the intentional tort is actuated by personal animosity and there is no close relation between the [tort] and the performance of the duties of employment. Hagenloh, 247 S.W.2d at 241. 31 Rodriguez cites several examples where the employer was not held liable for an employee's acts done while turned aside from the employer's business. See Smith v. M Sys. Food Stores, 156 Tex. 484, 297 S.W.2d 112, 114 (1957) (finding no employer liability for assault and false arrest by security guard of shoplifter's spouse where assault was directly in response to comments by spouse); Lowry v. Anderson-Berney Bldg. Co., 139 Tex. 29, 161 S.W.2d 459, 462 (1942) (finding a lack of evidence that employee who intentionally hit an independent contractor was within scope of employment); Viking v. Circle K Convenience Stores, Inc., 742 S.W.2d 732, 733-34 (Tex.App.--Houston [1st Dist.] 1987, writ denied) (finding no employer liability where employee left store unattended to retrieve a gun and shoot a person for scratching his car); Bradford v. Fort Worth Transit Co., 450 S.W.2d 919, 927 (Tex.Civ.App.--Fort Worth 1970, writ ref'd n.r.e.) (sustaining jury verdict which found that bus driver's sole motive in shooting passenger who attacked him was self defense and not within scope of employment); Adami, 440 S.W.2d at 332-33 (finding no employer liability for employee's killing of person who failed to close a gate on a ranch where the employee left the land to confront the deceased); Mitchell v. Ellis, 374 S.W.2d 333, 335 (Tex.Civ.App.--Fort Worth 1964, writ ref'd) (finding no employer liability for employee's negligent parking of truck while stopped to get cigarettes). 32 Besides the above physical examples of an employee turning aside from the employer's business, Rodriguez argues that a mental turning aside also takes an employee outside the scope of his employment. He relies upon Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 307 F.2d 120 (5th Cir.1962), and the Restatement (Second) of Agency § 235 for the proposition that an employee can be performing the acts of its employer, but still be acting outside the scope of his employment when his motives are to accomplish a purpose of his own. His reliance upon Standard Oil is misplaced, however, because it applies federal law, not Texas law, in discussing whether criminal liability, not tortious liability, should be imputed to an employer for the acts of its employees in the process of stealing from that same employer. Id. at 122-23, 126-30. 33 Rodriguez's reliance upon the Restatement does support his proposition and is not necessarily misplaced because the Texas Supreme Court has adopted the Restatement 's general test for respondeat superior, and where there is no contrary case law, it is likely to follow related provisions of the Restatement. See Aliota v. Graham, 984 F.2d 1350, 1358 (3d Cir.1993); see also M Sys. Food Stores, 297 S.W.2d at 114 (quoting RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF AGENCY, supra, § 229); Dobson v. Don January Roofing Co., 392 S.W.2d 153, 155 (Tex.Civ.App.--Tyler 1965, writ ref'd n.r.e.) (quoting RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF AGENCY, supra, § 235). Section 235 states that if an act is done with no intention to perform it as a part of or incident to a service on account of which he is employed then the act is not within the scope of employment. RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF AGENCY, supra, § 235. Rodriguez relies upon the commentary which notes that this rule applies even if the act would be authorized on behalf of the employer. See id. cmt. a. The commentary goes on to state, however, that acts are within the scope of employment if the servant is actuated to some extent by an intent to serve his master and notes that an employer may still be liable where an employee departs from instructions for his own purposes if such departure is undertaken with the intent to serve his employer. Id. cmts. a & b. Section 236 addresses the circumstance where an employee acts with two purposes--one personal and one to further the business of the employer--and imputes liability even if the predominant motive of the servant is personal. Id. § 236 & cmt. e; see also id. cmt. a (including liability for the act and its manner of performance for objects in conflict with employer's). 4 34 Without relying upon the Restatement, Texas case law has found an employer liable where the employee has mentally turned aside from the employer's business. In H.T. Cab Co. v. Ginns, 280 S.W.2d 360, 362 (Tex.Civ.App.--Galveston 1955, writ ref'd n.r.e.), a cabdriver shot a passenger in a dispute over the amount of a fare. The court accepted that the cabdriver was humoring his own spite in shooting the passenger, but it sustained a jury verdict finding that the cab driver was acting within the scope of his employment when he shot the passenger. Id. at 365. In Houston Transit Co. v. Felder, the Texas Supreme Court also sustained a jury verdict imputing liability to the employer of a bus driver who assaulted another motorist who had run into the bus. 208 S.W.2d at 881. Although the bus driver stated that his attack was in direct response to the other driver's comments and because the other driver put his hands on him, the court sustained the jury verdict because the attack was so closely connected with the performance of the bus driver's duty to collect information from the other driver. Id. at 881; see also Hagenloh, 247 S.W.2d at 241 (citing cases where no liability could be imputed because the assault was actuated by personal animosity and ... there was no close relation between the assault and the performance of the duties of the employment (emphasis added)).