Homeowners often invite independent contractors to their home to perform necessary tasks. Lawn care, housekeeping, painters, and repairmen for example. What happens if these contractors are hurt while they are working on your property? Are you liable? Generally, employers of independent contractors are under a duty to provide them with a reasonably safe work environment or give warning of danger. In Mississippi, an independent contractor may be barred from recovery if their injury is “intimately connected” to their job. Under the intimately connected doctrine, liability is not generally imposed on an owner who contracts with another to perform work, and the contractor or their employee suffers injuries that arose out of or were intimately connected with the work.
Consider the Mississippi Supreme Court’s holding in Vu v. Clayton. In Vu, an independent contractor brought suit against a building owner and a tenant operating a restaurant in the owner’s building. The tenant hired the contractor to install an air conditioner in the attic. While installing the air conditioner, the contractor fell through the ceiling and seriously injured his arm. The contractor sued both the owner and the tenant, and both moved for summary judgment asserting, among other defenses, the intimately connected doctrine. The trial court granted both defendants summary judgment. The Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s decision entitling defendants to judgment as a matter of law. The Vu Court did not focus on whether the property owner was the contracting party, but instead, on the nature of the contracted work and whether the injury arose from or was intimately connected to that work.
The Court reaffirmed the intimately connected doctrine in Grammar v. Dollar. In Dollar, a housekeeper brought a negligence action against homeowners after she slipped on a wet linoleum floor in the master bathroom and the resulting fall shattered her kneecap. The homeowners argued that the housekeeper could not recover because she was, and independent contractor and her job was intimately connected to her injury. The Plaintiff argued that she was not working at the time of her injury but was there for personal reasons instead. The Dollar Court, however, found the housekeeper was an independent contractor and that she was performing her duties when she was injured. Because this injury was intimately connected with her job, the housekeeper would be barred from recovery.
The Legal Lounge Conclusion
Homeowners’ and their insurance providers should be aware of this affirmative defense as it may allow for early dismissal of claims against them. Contact Brown Legal Group today for more on liability for independent contractors’ claims against residential and commercial property owners.