231 Conn. 265 | Conn. | 1994
The dispositive issue in this appeal is whether General Statutes § lA-lMa
The relevant facts are undisputed. The driver caused serious personal injury to the plaintiff while operating a vehicle that the lessor had rented to Miguel Santana. Santana had procured the vehicle, either for his own use to replace a disabled vehicle or for the driver’s use at the driver’s request. The driver was neither a spouse nor an employer of Santana, nor were they jointly engaged in legal business activities. The lease agreement between Santana and the lessor had an express provision defining who would qualify as an “authorized driver” under the lease.
The plaintiff advances four contentions in his brief in support of his argument for reversal of the trial court’s granting of the lessor’s motion for summary
Our assessment of the plaintiff’s various claims under § 14-154a must start with the text of that statute. It provides, in to to, that “[a]ny person renting or leasing to another any motor vehicle owned by him shall be liable for any damage to any person or property caused by the operation of such motor vehicle while so rented or leased, to the same extent as the operator would have been liable if he had also been the owner.” We have repeatedly stated our view of the purpose of the statute. “[It] cannot be regarded otherwise than as an expression of legislative judgment as to the extent—beyond the limitations of the general principles of respondeat superior and the ‘family-car doctrine’—to which the owner of a motor vehicle which he entrusts to another should be liable for the acts of the latter. . . . We have consistently construed the statute as imposing on one who rents or leases a motor vehicle to another the same liability as that of its operator, provided the vehicle, at the time in question, is being operated by one in lawful possession of it pursuant to the terms of the contract of rental. ” (Citations omitted; emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted.)
In light of this long-standing interpretation of § 14-154a, we may readily dispose of the plaintiffs broad contention that the statute imposes unlimited liability on the lessor for any injury caused by any motor vehicle that it owns. If the plaintiff were correct, a lessor would be responsible for the tortious misconduct of a thief who stole a vehicle from the lessor’s parking lot. Indeed, any automobile dealer, if the dealership engaged in lease as well as in sales transactions, might be liable for tortious misconduct arising out of the theft of any car on its sales lot. Nothing in the language of the statute, its statutory history, or our prior case law, suggests that the statute extends that far. Our decision in Connelly v. Deconinck, supra, 113 Conn. 240, is directly to the contrary. At oral argument in this court, the plaintiff acknowledged that this argument is untenable.
We are equally unpersuaded that, even liberally construed, § 14-154a imposes unlimited liability on any lessor that voluntarily entrusts a motor vehicle to a lessee. In effect, the plaintiff argues that, under the statute, any voluntary entrusting confers upon the lessee the unconditional authority to permit any person of the lessee’s choice to drive the vehicle. As a consequence, according to the plaintiff, any voluntary entrusting imposes on the lessor the duty to pay damages for any
The plaintiffs argument is necessarily predicated on the proposition that the lessee’s scope of authority and the lessor’s statutory liability are determined by the statute without regard to the terms of the lease agreement pursuant to which the voluntary entrusting occurred. There is no binding authority for that proposition. The statute does not, in its terms, preclude a lessor from imposing reasonable restrictions on the identity of those to whom it is willing to entrust its property and for whose conduct it is willing to assume risk. In the cases in which we have found a basis for enforcing statutory liability, the tortfeasor invariably has been found to have been a person who had possession of the vehicle in accordance with the lease agreement. Gionfriddo v. Avis Rent A Car System, Inc., supra, 192 Conn. 284; Fisher v. Hodge, supra, 162 Conn. 367-68;
As an alternative to his argument relying on entrusting, the plaintiff contends that, by operation of law, § 14-154a confers upon him the status of a common law third party beneficiary of the lease agreement between the lessor and Santana without regard to the specific limitation on authorized drivers contained in that agreement. We disagree. As a matter of contract law, the rights of a third party beneficiary are necessarily circumscribed by the terms of the contract that the beneficiary seeks to enforce. See, e.g., Knapp v. New Haven Road Construction Co., 150 Conn. 321, 325, 189 A.2d 386 (1963); Colonial Discount Co. v. Avon Motors, Inc., 137 Conn. 196, 201, 75 A.2d 507 (1950). The plaintiff has cited no authority to indicate that the legislature intended, by enacting § 14-154a, to enlarge a beneficiary’s rights in the manner he has suggested.
Finally, we are unpersuaded by the plaintiff’s argument that, if his right to recovery depends upon a construction of the terms of the lease agreement, there is an unresolved question of fact whether the driver in this case was an “authorized driver” as that term was defined in the lease agreement. The lease agreement defined the persons who might lawfully operate the leased vehicle with Santana’s permission: Santana’s spouse, employer or “co-workers if engaged in business related activities with the Renter”; a parking attendant; or a person using the car “during an emergency situation.” See footnote 2. The plaintiff relies on the driver’s affidavit as raising a factual question about whether Santana and the driver could be considered coworkers. Because the driver, in that affidavit, describes himself and Santana as being jointly engaged in illegal drug activities, the plaintiff maintains that they were “engaged in business related
The judgment is affirmed.
In this opinion the other justices concurred.
General Statutes § 14-154a provides: “Liability of owner for damage caused by rented or leased car. Any person renting or leasing to another any motor vehicle owned by him shall be liable for any damage to any person or property caused by the operation of such motor vehicle while so rented or leased, to the same extent as the operator would have been liable if he had also been the owner.”
Section 4 of the lease agreement provides: “authorized drivers: The Renter and the following validly licensed individuals with Renter’s permission (‘Authorized Drivers’) may operate the Vehicle: Renter’s spouse, employer or co-workers if engaged in business related activities with the Renter, persons parking the Vehicle at commercial establishments or persons during an emergency situation. All other additional Authorized Drivers must appear at the time of rental and be named on the face of this Agreement. All Authorized Drivers must have a valid drivers license and be at least 21 years old. Other qualifications and charges may be in place at the time of rental.”
We recognize that, in Fisher v. Hodge, supra, 162 Conn. 367-68, in which we concluded that the tortfeasor was a driver who had authority to drive the car within the terms of the lease agreement, we went on to state that § 14-154a imposes liability on a lessor “regardless of the provisions of the rental contract restricting the use of the automobile to specified individuals.” Id., 368-69. This dictum is not consistent with our decisions in preceding or subsequent cases, and it is hereby overruled.
We note that the plaintiff does not contend that the definition of the class of “authorized drivers” in the lease agreement was either unconscionable in its inception or invoked by the lessor in bad faith.