Steward v. Bd. of Trustees Cal. State Univ.
Plaintiff Norma Steward appeals from a judgment entered in favor of defendant Board of Trustees of the California State University (CSU). The trial court granted CSU's motion for summary judgment on the ground that the undisputed facts establish that CSU may not be held liable for an accident caused by CSU employee (and codefendant in the underlying action) Dennis Guseman. Guseman was on his way to have breakfast with a former colleague before going to work when the accident occurred.
On appeal, Steward argues that summary judgment in CSU's favor was improper because there remain material questions of fact related to either of two possible theories of respondeat superior liability. First, she contends that the trial court erred in concluding that, as a matter of law, Guseman's breakfast meeting with his former colleague was a personal errand and did not come within the scope of his employment. According to Steward, if the trial court had properly concluded that there remains a factual dispute as to whether the breakfast meeting had a business purpose, then it is possible that Guseman could be found to have been on his way to "work" at the time of the accident, and that his commute to the breakfast meeting could therefore be considered to fall within the scope of his employment.
Steward next argues in the alternative that even if Guseman's planned breakfast was a purely personal endeavor as a matter of law, CSU could still be liable under the theory that Guseman's commute that morning was within the scope of his employment, and that the breakfast meeting was simply a minor deviation from, rather than a substantial abandonment of, his commute to work at the CSU San Marcos (CSUSM) campus.
We affirm the judgment in favor of CSU because Steward cannot prove that Guseman's conduct in driving to breakfast that morning was reasonably related to his job, or that his personal errand to meet a former colleague and friend for breakfast was reasonably foreseeable in light of CSU's business or Guseman's job responsibilities, such that CSU may be held liable for the accident that Guseman caused on his way to breakfast.
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