124 A. 835 | Conn. | 1924
The evidence presented by the plaintiff tended to prove these facts: The plaintiff while walking on Chapel Street, New Haven, and while in the exercise of due care, was struck and injured by an automobile owned by the defendant's testator, Henry Herz, which was then being negligently driven by his chauffeur, one Abel. Abel had been in the employ of Herz as chauffeur for several years, and the automobile was kept in a public garage on Bradley Street. While not engaged in driving for Herz, it was the duty of Abel to remain at the garage to receive and obey any orders Herz might desire to give.
On the day of the accident Abel had driven Miss Herz on a shopping trip in the morning and had returned the car to the garage about half past eleven.
Herz was accustomed to order the car from the garage for an afternoon ride from one-thirty to two o'clock daily. Abel had received permission from Herz to use the car to go to a garage in Fair Haven to obtain a timer for a Ford car owned by a brother of Abel. On the day in question, in pursuance of this permission, Abel drove the car from the Bradley Street garage about twelve-fifteen at noon to the garage in Fair Haven, and learned that he could not get a timer there. He then started to return to the Bradley Street *704 garage in ample time to arrive there before one-thirty in order to be ready to obey Herz's customary orders.
The court upon these facts granted the defendant's motion for a judgment as of nonsuit, and refused to set the judgment aside.
The plaintiff claims that this was erroneous; that upon the facts proved the plaintiff had established a prima facie case. The mere fact that the master had given the chauffeur permission to so use the car does not of itself create a liability of the master during the period of such permissive use. The permission made the chauffeur a licensee of the car, during the trip to the Fair Haven garage. It is generally well settled that the employer is not liable for injuries or damage caused by the negligent operation of his automobile while it is being used by an employee for his own business or pleasure, and not in the master's business, although the owner has consented to such use. Adomaitis v.Hopkins,
The question presented to us is whether the evidence introduced by the plaintiff tends to prove the essential allegations of the complaint. The trial court was of the opinion that it did not, because it held that the chauffeur was using the defendant's car with the owner's permission at the time of the collision, and was not engaged in the owner's business. The defendant claimed that the court erred in so holding, because the law as established in this State, when applied to the evidence introduced, discloses that the chauffeur was engaged in the master's business within the scope of *705
his employment when the collision occurred. In other words, he claimed that the collision occurred when the chauffeur, after the execution of the specific purpose of his own for which the owner had permitted him to use the car, was returning it to the garage under an implied direction of the owner, and hence was then engaged in the master's business. We are of the opinion that, under the law, the chauffeur was then engaged in the master's business. In McKiernan v. Lehmaier,
In the instant case the chauffeur had implied orders to return the car to the garage when his private business was completed; he was operating the defendant's car back to the garage for the purpose of discharging the duty for which he was employed and intended to *706
perform when the collision occurred, and was not then engaged in an affair of his own, but was attending to his master's business. The fact that the chauffeur on his return, in the instant case, intended to await his master's orders at the garage instead of in front of a theater, does not essentially differentiate this case fromMcKiernan v. Lehmaier,
In many jurisdictions a like rule of law has been established substantially to the following effect: When an owner of an automobile has given an employee permission to use the car for a specific purpose of his own, with an express or implied direction to return the car to a particular place in order to continue his services to the master, and when the employee has used the car and accomplished the specific purpose of his own at a point some distance from the place to which he was expressly or impliedly directed to return the car, then while he is returning the car to such place he is engaged in the master's business within the scope of his employment. 22 A. L. R., p. 1409, § VII, and cases cited. In Graham v. Henderson,
The fact that an automobile is a dangerous instrumentality and that the permitting an employee to use it for his own purposes is in the nature of a use for family purposes, has influenced the courts for reasons of public policy to construe strictly the extent of the license involved in such permissive use of an automobile by an employee.
The instant case does not present any question of deviation or departure, but it is suggestive to note that the principle of law involved in McKiernan v. Lehmaier
and Graham v. Henderson, supra, have been applied to a servant returning to his normal duties after a deviation or departure. Riley v. Standard Oil Co.,
There is error, the judgment is set aside and a new trial ordered.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.