explaining that for a negligent entrustment claim, “a plaintiff must show that anything found in a background check would cause a reasonable employer not to hire the employee, or would be sufficient to put the employer on notice that hiring the employee would create a risk of harm to the public.” (internal quotations omitted and citations incorporated)
How later courts described this case
- explaining that for a negligent entrustment claim, “a plaintiff must show that anything found in a background check would cause a reasonable employer not to hire the employee, or would be sufficient to put the employer on notice that hiring the employee would create a risk of harm to the public.” (internal quotations omitted and citations incorporated)
- concluding reverse the judgment of the court of appeals insofar as it that negligent hiring should have a similar requirement to affirmed the award of compensatory and exemplary negligent entrustment cases, which requires that the em- damages for negligent hiring and supervision, and render ployee's negligent conduct harm the plaintiff
- concluding that the expert’s “observations, measurements, and calculations were . . . tied to physical 81 evidence in the case which likewise provided support for his conclusions and theory” thus “meet[ing] our standard for reliability”
- rejecting the argument that a reconstructionist’s “lack of knowledge of the manufacturing process of the black box and its accelerometer or of the black box’s error rate affected the reliability of his testimony” because his testimony “tied the black box data into evidence obtained at the scene, which supported his conclusions”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Justice WAINWRIGHT,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
The vehicle accident in this case occurred in the gravel truck’s eastbound lane when the westbound Yukon sport utility vehicle crossed the center line of the highway. This is undisputed. All five eyewitnesses in three separate vehicles who spoke to the question, some from better vantages than others, testified that they never saw the gravel truck in the westbound lane. Yet the claimant’s expert opined that the gravel truck driver caused the accident. It allegedly crossed into the westbound lane, forced the Yukon to move into the eastbound lane in a defensive maneuver, and then returned to the eastbound lane to cause the collision. The expert reviewed and discussed physical evidence in the form of gouge marks on the road, collision damage to both vehicles, brake mark angles, and speed and braking information from the Yukon’s black box. I have serious concerns about the admissibility of the expert’s causation testimony because, among other reasons, the expert has not sufficiently addressed the eyewitness testimony. See, e.g., Brooke Group Ltd. v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 509 U.S. 209, 243 , 113 S.Ct. 2578 , 125 L.Ed.2d 168 (1993) (holding that expert testimony is not admissible when it is not supported by sufficient facts or when the evidence in the case contradicts or otherwise renders the opinion unreasonable); see also TXI Transp. Co. v. Hughes, 224 S.W.3d 870, 923, 927-29 (Tex.App.-Fort Worth, pet. granted) (Gardner, J., dissenting) (addressing the eyewitness testimony and other reasons to exclude the expert’s opinion). I respectfully concur in part and dissent in part, joining only Section III of the Court’s opinion.