Susemiehl v. Red River Lumber Co.
Illinois Appellate Court
28 N.E.2d 743 (1940)
- Written by Darius Dehghan, JD
Facts
Walter Gehrke (defendant) was in an automobile accident that killed Walter Susemiehl. Gehrke was a salesman for Red River Lumber Company (Red River) (defendant). Henry Susemiehl (plaintiff), the administrator of Walter Susemiehl’s estate, brought a wrongful-death suit against Gehrke and Red River. Red River argued that, at the time of the accident, Gehrke was not acting within the scope of his employment. Thus, Red River claimed that it was not vicariously liable for Gehrke’s conduct. In order to rebut this claim, Henry introduced a report written by J. P. Rinn, the managing officer of Red River. In the report, Rinn stated that, at the time of the accident, Gehrke was driving his car on regular company business. Rinn did not have personal knowledge as to whether Gehrke was engaged in regular company business at the time of the accident. The trial-court judge admitted Rinn’s out-of-court statement into evidence. Subsequently, the jury ruled in favor of Henry. Red River appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Wolfe, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 832,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,500 briefs, keyed to 994 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.
