# Farmers Insurance Group v. County of Santa Clara

> California Supreme Court · December 6, 1995 · 11 Cal. 4th 992

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9533530

## Case

- **Full name:** FARMERS INSURANCE GROUP Et Al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA Et Al., Defendants and Respondents
- **Court:** California Supreme Court
- **Decided:** December 6, 1995
- **Citations:** 11 Cal. 4th 992; 47 Cal. Rptr. 2d 478; 95 Daily Journal DAR 16145; 906 P.2d 440; 11 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 1256; 69 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 1120; 95 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 9298; 1995 Cal. LEXIS 6796
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Baxter
- **Judges:** Baxter, George, Werdegar, Mosk
- **Cited by:** 168 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9533530

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- holding that the County could not be held vicariously liable for sexual harassment by a deputy sheriff who worked at jail, even though harassment occurred during work hours at the jail, because the misconduct was “motivated for strictly personal reasons unrelated to the guardi…
- holding that fact that nearly all 24 of harassing conduct took place at workplace during work hours was insufficient to establish that 25 wrongdoer was acting within scope of his employment
- acknowledging that the applicable statutes “indicate that respondeat superior and scope of employment principles are supposed to play an integral role in fixing an *51 employer’s liability for both supervisor and nonsupervisor sexual harassment” but applying the aided-by-agenc…
- noting that California cases generally decline to find vicarious liability for sexual misconduct other than in police-officer cases because “it [can] not be demonstrated that the various acts of sexual misconduct ar[i]se from the” conduct of the enterprise
- explaining the operation of the applicable Government Code provisions on municipal employee indemnification

## Opinion text

BAXTER, J., Concurring.
Although I authored the majority opinion, I write separately to reiterate my disagreement with Mary M. v. City of Los Angeles (1991) 54 Cal.3d 202 [ 285 Cal.Rptr. 99 , 814 P.2d 1341 ] (Mary M.) and to clarify that I adhere to the views set forth in my concurrence to that opinion and to those expressed by Justice George’s concurrence in the case at bar.
I also write separately because, while I agree with Justice George that Mary M. was wrongly decided and should be overruled, I do not believe this case presents the proper vehicle because the facts here are amply distinguishable.

---

Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9533530. Public record. Not legal advice.