A California appellate court on Friday affirmed summary judgment for a contractor in a workplace injury case, reinforcing limits on third-party liability under the state’s longstanding Privette doctrine, which the court said creates a “strong presumption” that a hiring contractor delegates responsibility for workplace safety to the subcontractor performing the work.
In Cordero v. Ghilotti Construction Co., Inc., the California Court of Appeal held that Ghilotti Construction was not liable for injuries sustained by a subcontractor’s employee who slipped and fell while working on a bridge project.
The plaintiff, an ironworker employed by a subcontractor, was injured after climbing a rebar structure and slipping, allegedly due to muddy conditions at the jobsite. He argued that the contractor retained control over site safety and had a nondelegable duty under California workplace safety regulations.
The appeals court rejected those arguments, finding the case fell squarely within the Privette doctrine, which generally bars employees of subcontractors from suing upstream contractors for workplace injuries.
Judges also rejected the worker’s claim that California Department of Industrial Relations, or Cal/OSHA, regulations imposed a nondelegable duty on the contractor. Citing precedent, the court said such regulatory duties are typically delegated along with responsibility for jobsite safety when an independent contractor is hired.
The worker further argued that the contractor retained control over site conditions, including efforts to remove standing water. But the court said there was no evidence the contractor directed how the subcontractor performed its work or interfered with its methods — a key requirement for the “retained control” exception to apply.
“Mere awareness of an unsafe condition or failure to correct it is not enough,” the court said in affirming the lower court’s ruling.
This article was first published in Business Insurance.
