LANSING, Mich. (Legal Newsline) – Ford Motor Company has won its appeal of a decision that found it could be liable for a fatal wreck involving a car leased by an employee through a company program.
On Sept. 10, the Michigan Court of Appeals ordered the trial court to enter summary disposition in the wrongful death case of Madison Cooke, who died in a wreck in Debra Ockerman’s Lincoln MKS Sedan.
Ockerman had leased the car through a program for management-level employees and retirees and in June 2015 allowed her 18-year-old daughter Megan to use the car.
The driver, Tyriq Strong, and Cooke were killed, while Megan Ockerman and Gina Badia were seriously injured on their way home from a music festival. Strong lost control and hit a tree.
Ford was sued as the statutory owner of the vehicle and was alleged to be vicariously liable for Strong’s negligent operation of it.
Ford said it was exempt from liability because it is a long-term lessor of more than 15,000 vehicles.
“Strong, who was driving the vehicle at the time of this accident, was not the lessee of the vehicle, he was not a Ford Motor employee conceivably acting within the scope of such employment when the accident occurred, the lease did not direct the lessee-employee to primarily use the car for Ford Motor’s testing and evaluation purposes, Strong was not driving the vehicle for the purpose of evaluating it at the behest of Ford Motor, and Ford Motor derived no benefit from Strong driving the leased vehicle at the time of the accident,” the decision says.
“Vicarious liability simply has no application under these circumstances.”