Shannon v. Pacific Rail

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
OCT 12 2000
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT PATRICK FISHER
Clerk
MICHAEL KEITH SHANNON;
ESTHER JEAN SHANNON, duly
appointed Next Friends of Michelle
Lyn Shannon, a minor,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
No. 00-3011
v. (D.C. No. CV-98-2451-JWL)
(D. Kan.)
PACIFIC RAIL SERVICES, L.L.C.,
a Delaware corporation,
Defendant-Appellee,
and
ARROW VOGEL,
Defendant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before TACHA , EBEL , and LUCERO , Circuit Judges.
*
This order and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the
doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. The court
generally disfavors the citation of orders and judgments; nevertheless, an order
and judgment may be cited under the terms and conditions of 10th Cir. R. 36.3.
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously to grant the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral
argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore
ordered submitted without oral argument.
Plaintiffs, as next friends of the minor child of Jennifer Shannon, appeal
from the district court’s grant of summary judgment to defendant Pacific Rail
Services, L.L.C. (Pacific Rail). See Shannon v. Pacific Rail Servs. , 70
F. Supp. 2d 1243, 1251 (D. Kan. 1999). The district court’s judgment in
plaintiffs’ favor against defendant Arrow Vogel is not before us. We exercise
jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and affirm.
Jennifer Shannon was struck and killed by a hostler truck driven by
defendant Arrow Vogel, an employee of Pacific Rail. A hostler is used to move
freight trailers and containers around a railway freight yard. On the evening of
her death, Ms. Shannon arrived at the rail yard where Mr. Vogel was working.
Despite Pacific Rail’s rules against visitors in the yard and on the hostlers, and
despite the “No Riders” sign on the cab of the hostler, Ms. Shannon climbed into
the hostler being operated by Mr. Vogel to ask him to lend her some money and
drive her home. After she left the hostler, Mr. Vogel moved it forward, crushing
her to death under a wheel. Plaintiffs filed this diversity action alleging that both
Pacific Rail and Mr. Vogel were liable for Ms. Shannon’s wrongful death. The
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district court held that Pacific Rail was not liable under a theory of respondeat
superior because at the time of Ms. Shannon’s death, Mr. Vogel was acting
outside the scope of his employment, and Ms. Shannon was a trespasser as to
Pacific Rail, who therefore owed her a duty only to avoid willfully, wantonly, or
recklessly injuring her.
On appeal, plaintiffs challenge the district court’s conclusion that
Mr. Vogel was not acting within the scope of his employment when Ms. Shannon
was killed. They assert that Pacific Rail is liable because it did not enforce its
policy against riders on its trucks, the actions of Mr. Vogel were foreseeable,
Pacific Rail ratified Mr. Vogel’s actions, and any deviation from Mr. Vogel’s
duties had ended at the time of the accident. In addition, plaintiffs claim that
Ms. Shannon was not a trespasser because she was paying a social call on
Mr. Vogel, and that Pacific Rail negligently failed to educate Mr. Vogel on the
dangers of permitting non-employees to enter the premises and trucks.
We review de novo the district court’s grant of summary judgment, viewing
the record in the light most favorable to the party opposing summary judgment.
See McKnight v. Kimberly Clark Corp., 149 F.3d 1125, 1128 (10th Cir. 1998).
Summary judgment is appropriate if there is no genuine issue of material fact and
the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. See Celotex Corp. v.
Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986); Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). Mere speculation
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unsupported by evidence is insufficient to resist summary judgment. See Beaird
v. Seagate Tech., Inc. , 145 F.3d 1159, 1170 (10th Cir. 1998); cf. Wasson v.
Brewer’s Food Mart, Inc. , 640 P.2d 352, 357 (Kan. Ct. App. 1982) (setting aside
jury verdict founded on speculation and conjecture).
We have carefully reviewed the record on appeal, as well as the briefs
submitted by the parties. We affirm the summary judgment in favor of Pacific
Rail for substantially the reasons stated in the district court’s order dated
September 28, 1999, and entered on the docket on September 29, 1999. On the
claim that Pacific Rail owed a duty to Ms. Shannon to educate Mr. Vogel about
the dangers to non-employees in the yard or on the hostlers, we conclude that
plaintiffs have not demonstrated that Pacific Rail owed Ms. Shannon such a duty
or that it failed in any such duty.
The judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Kansas
is AFFIRMED.
Entered for the Court
David M. Ebel
Circuit Judge
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