Liability apportioned | multiple vicarious tortfeasors involved in an accident?

A severe problem can develop for someone who rents a car and lets a friend drive the car who then causes a car accident. In this situation, three parties can be held liable for the accident. The friend that was driving, the friend that rented the car and the car rental company can all be held liable. It may not be fair to have the friend who merely rented the car face legal action, but this is what is referred as vicarious liability (holding a superior liable for acts of a subordinate) under the dangerous instrumentality doctrine. Another situations that could lead to vicarious liability arising include a friend who has borrowed a car allowing another friend to drive the borrowed car which results in a car accident. Similarly, when an employee operates a vehicle not belonging to his employer while conducting a function of his job, the employee can be liable as well as the owner of the vehicle. A Palm Beach County accident attorney handling your case should know about these relevant facts anytime you are involved in an accident, especially if it involves some kind of service personnel, city/county worker, or delivery driver. In these types of situations there probably will not be any coverage problems besides determining the order and priority of coverage. This will usually be resolved by looking at the rules that govern active tortfeasors (person who directly caused an injury). There may be a slight problem if none of the vicarious liability parties’ policies insure active torfeasors. This will likely be resolved by looking at the order and priority of each policy, but if each vicarious party falls under the omnibus insured category, the determination will be based on the rules governing “other insurance” clauses. If one vicarious party is found to be more responsible than another vicarious party, the more responsible party should pay first. Aurbach v. Gallina, 753 So.2d 60 (Fla. 2000). As the line of cases that have used this rationale have held, the dangerous instrumentality and respondeat superior doctrines of law are meant to encourage people who have control of a car to choose careful drivers. So, in a situation where an employee used a non-employer vehicle to perform a job function which causes an accident, the employer’s insurance carrier should probably pay first because the employer presumably will be more responsible than the third party. In a Palm Beach County accident case, if the court cannot clearly distinguish the more responsible party, they will use a pro-rata allocation for public policy reasons. Allstate Insurance Co. v. Dairyland Insurance Co., 271 So.2d 457 (Fla. 1973

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