New York City elevator accident update: five workers fired

Transel Elevator, Inc., the company responsible for maintaining the elevators in the Manhattan office building where a young advertising executive was killed last December, has fired five of its elevator mechanics in connection with the accident. Transel announced the dismissals only two days after New York City investigators reported their finding that a crucial safety system (which could have prevented the elevator accident) had been disabled.

Our attorneys have closely followed this story since it occurred (see previous posts created in January and February) and are not surprised by these latest developments. Employers often fire employees after a serious or fatal accident for various reasons, sometimes justifiably and sometimes not. What Transel’s decision to fire these mechanics will not do, however, is relieve the company of legal responsibility for employee actions occurring within the scope of employment.

At issue here is a legal doctrine known as respondeat superior, which essentially holds that employers are liable for the negligent acts or omissions of employees, provided those acts or omissions occurred within the course of employment.

What employee actions are included the “scope of employment/course of employment” requirement? Basically, this means that if an employee is performing the job duties they were hired to perform and others are injured as a result, the employer is strictly liable.

In this case, the elevator mechanics have been accused of negligence with respect to their work on a particular elevator, which is, of course, within the job description of an elevator mechanic. In other words, it’s highly unlikely that Transel will be able to avoid liability for damages related to this elevator accident.

For purposes of contrast, suppose that negligent maintenance or repair work had nothing to do with this woman’s death. Suppose instead that the woman died because she was assaulted by a Transel employee. If this were the case, Transel would have a defense to any subsequent premises liability lawsuit because the employee’s actions were not within the scope of employment.

Source: The Huffington Post, “New York City Elevator Accident: 5 Transel Employees Fired After Suzanne Hart’s Death,” Jennifer Peltz, March 1, 2012