Court Opinion

ID: 9542147
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:31:32.418802+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:03:04.749232
License: Public Domain

Thompson, J.,
dissenting:
This appeal from an prder denying the motion of National Convenience Stores, Inc., for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict presents a question of law as to whether National’s employee, David Wagner, was acting within the scope and course of his employment when a tragic accident happened. A jury found that Wagner had negligently driven his automobile proximately causing the death of two people and serious personal injuries to a third person. Damages in excess of three-quarters of a million dollars were assessed against Wagner and his employer, National. It was National’s contention in presenting its motion for a judgment N.O.V., and now on this appeal, that it cannot be vicariously liable for the tort of Wagner since he was not acting within the scope and course of his employment when the accident happened. In my opinion the record supports this contention.
As to the liability of National the action was tried to the jury on the theory of respondeat superior.1 Consequently, the evidence must reflect the right of National to control Wagner’s conduct on the day when the accident occurred. Wells, Inc. v. *660Shoemake, 64 Nev. 57, 64, 65, 177 P.2d 451 (1947). This evidence does not exist.
National operates a chain of small Stop N Go grocery stores. National hired Wagner as a manager trainee. One of his tasks was to get shelf measurements of all of the Stop N Go stores. He used his own car in traveling from store to store.
March 24, 1972, the day of the accident, was Wagner’s day off. While driving his car he remembered that he had not obtained the shelf measurements of a store located on Desert Inn Road, and decided to go there for that purpose. His employer, National, did not know of his decision to do so. As Wagner turned onto Desert Inn Road, he engaged in a drag race with a teenage driver who had pulled alongside, and soon thereafter Wagner lost control of his car and the tragic accident occurred.
The relation of master and servant did not exist when this accident happened because National had not advised Wagner that he could act for it on that day. Indeed, National had no idea that Wagner would spontaneously, on his day off, drive toward a Stop N Go store with the thought of doing some work there. Wagner did nothing for his employer on March 24, 1972. He never reached the Stop N Go store. His conduct cannot be said to have benefited National in any way.
As I see it, today’s opinion allows the imposition of vicarious liability solely on the basis of an employee’s assertion that, on his day off, he was going to do some work for his employer when the accident happened. I find no authority to support this proposition.

The enterprise theory of liability, i.e., where, the inquiry is whether the specific risk is one that may fairly be regarded as typical of or broadly incidental to the employer’s enterprise, was not involved in this action. For further explanation of this theory, see Rodgers v. Kemper Construction Co., 124 Cal.Rptr. 143 (Cal.App. 1975); 2 Harper & James, The Law of Torts 1376 (1956).