Torts – FTCA — borrowed employees

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United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Torts – FTCA — borrowed employees

A driver employed by a private trucking company with a “Highway Contract Route” with the U.S. Postal Service is not also a “borrowed employee” of the Postal Service for purposes of the Federal Tort Claims Act.

“The private trucking company does not merely ‘lend employees’ to the Postal Service but provides mail transportation and delivery services. The company trains, equips, pays, and supervises its own employees using its own equipment to provide these services. We therefore reverse the district court’s grant of judgment for the government in this case. Our decision is consistent with decisions in many cases in which injured persons have sued the Postal Service for injuries caused by the negligence of HCR drivers. In those cases the Postal Service has successfully argued that the HCR drivers are independent contractors rather than borrowed employees for whose negligence the Postal Service could be held liable.”

Reversed and Remanded.

12-1107 Couch v. U.S.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Marovich, J., Hamilton, J.