Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California
liability for theft of personal property
i would like to know if my car was robbed while i was staying at a motel by one of their employees whom they fired afterwards our they liable for my losses?
3 Answers from Attorneys
Re: liability for theft of personal property
Only if the hotel management was negligent in acting after knowing or if they should have known of the criminal tendencies of their employee.
Re: liability for theft of personal property
As a general rule, employees are not responsible for the crimes of their employees. However, as a practical matter, we have seen people on this website settle these matters with the employer. Your cause of action, should you decide to sue, would be "negligent hiring." You would than have to prove that they knew or should have know of the employee's criminal tendencies. Personally I would not attempt it past the settlement stage but if you do, you are going to have to come up with real evidence that they knew about this guy. Otherwise, as I said, they are not responsible for their employee's torts or crimes. Employers are responsible for their employees' negligence under a theory called "respondeat superior", but not for their intentional crimes.
Re: liability for theft of personal property
I would say so.
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