Williams v. Munford, Inc.
| Decision Date | 26 August 1982 |
| Docket Number | No. 82-4142,82-4142 |
| Citation | 683 F.2d 938 |
| Parties | Sharon WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. MUNFORD, INC., d/b/a Majik Markets, Defendant-Appellant. Summary Calendar. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Donald V. Burch, Roger C. Clapp, Jackson, Miss., for defendant-appellant.
Al N. Hopkins, Lisa P. Dodson, Gulfport, Miss., for plaintiff-appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi.
Before GEE, RUBIN and POLITZ, Circuit Judges.
The appellee, an eighteen-year-old convenience store clerk, was overpowered and raped in the course of a store robbery. On her factual allegations-which we take as true for purposes of passing on this appeal from denial of a motion to dismiss-this cowardly and vicious assault took place at 4:00 a. m., in a high-crime area of Gulfport. The store had been frequently robbed, with concomitant injuries to other clerks, but despite these incidents had been provided neither security devices, guards, or other safeguards of any kind. Appellee had no key to lock doors and was forbidden to keep a weapon.
She sued her employer in tort. Her arguments, which we consider below, prevailed so far with the district judge as to cause him to deny a motion to dismiss, one grounded in the "coverage" and "bar" provisions of the Mississippi workers' compensation laws. A federal court sitting in diversity, in such a case as this our duty is to carry out the policy choices enacted by the Mississippi Legislature in its compensation laws, even as a Mississippi court should do.
What has Mississippi said? Of this, there can be little doubt. Such suits against employers as that of Ms. Williams are barred 1 if they concern an injury arising out of and in the course of the employment. Such an injury is defined as:
"Injury" means accidental injury or accidental death arising out of and in the course of employment, and ... includes an injury caused by the willful act of a third person directed against an employee because of his employment while so employed and working on the job.
Miss.Code Ann. § 71-3-3 (Supp.1981) (the "Act").
Generally, Mississippi courts have interpreted the above-quoted language broadly, finding coverage so long as three criteria are met: (1) the injury occurred within the time frame of employment; (2) the employee was within the spatial area required by employment at the time of injury; and (3) there existed a causal connection between the activity causing injury and the interests of the employer. See Big "2" Engine Rebuilders v. Freeman, 379 So.2d 888 (Miss.1980).
Appellee Williams asserts that the act of rape breaks the causal connection required by element (3) above and thus that her injury occurred outside the scope of employment. This legal theory suggests that an employer's liability is conditioned by the type of tort inflicted upon an employee by a third person. While no Mississippi court has expressly rejected appellee's legal theory, the Mississippi Supreme Court has taken a decidedly different approach to the determination of liability under the Act:
(T)he test of recovery is not a causal relation between the nature of employment of the injured person and the accident. Nor is it necessary that the employee be engaged at the time of the injury in activity of benefit to his employer. All that is required is that the "obligations or conditions" of employment create a "zone of special danger" out of which the injury arose.
Brookhaven Steam Laundry v. Watts, 214 Miss. 569, 55 So.2d 381, 392 (1951), rev'd in part and aff'd in part on rehearing, 214 Miss. 569, 59 So.2d 294 (1952) (citation omitted, emphasis supplied). The general rule that emerges from the above-underscored language is that an employer's liability under the Act is not determined by the type of tort inflicted upon an employee but rather is determined by whether the injury arose as a result of a risk created by employment conditions. See Bivens v. Marshall R. Young Drilling Co., 251 Miss. 261, 169 So.2d 446 (1964). Absent this specific causal connection, no Mississippi court has ever found employer liability for compensation. Such a connection and such liability are plainly present here.
Williams argues, however, that the present case lacks the specific causal connection required by the Act and relies heavily on Ellis v. Rose Oil Co., 190 So.2d 450 (Miss.1966); Estate of West v. Southern Bell Telephone & Telegraph Co., 228 Miss. 890, 90 So.2d 1 (Miss.1956), and Brookhaven Steam Laundry v. Watts, supra, in support of this proposition. This reliance, however, is misplaced. In each of the above-cited cases the court found that the injury was occasioned by an antecedent personal vendetta totally extraneous to the work environment and thus was not compensable within the terms of the Act.
The analysis of the Ellis court confirms this reasoning:
The death of the employee involved in this case arose in the course of his employment, but his death did not arise out (of) his employment. We affirm on the authority of West Estate v. Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company and Brookhaven Steam Laundry v. Watts. These cases are authority for the proposition that when an employee's death is caused by the willful act of a third person intending to injure him because of reasons personal to such third person and not because of the employee's employment, the death is not compensable.
190 So.2d at 450 (citations omitted). The legal theory informing the Ellis court's reasoning is that when an intentional tort is committed by a third person on the employment premises for reasons personal to the employee and such a third person-reasons unrelated to the obligations or conditions of employment-the injury cannot be said to occur within the zone of risks created by the employment relationship. The Mississippi Supreme Court has stated that such a tort must fall outside of the employment relationship (and outside the scope of the Act) because the premises of employment merely provide a stage for the vindication of a personal vendetta....
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