TRUMBULL COUNTY Appeals court orders lawsuit to be revisited

A man says an employee for Action Emergency Ambulance hit him when he refused to get onto a hospital bed.
WARREN -- The 11th District Court of Appeals has ruled that a Trumbull County Common Pleas court erred when dismissing a lawsuit filed by a Newton Falls man against Action Emergency Ambulance.
The appeals court stated in a 14-page written opinion that Judge Andrew Logan should not have dismissed Willie Smith's lawsuit on the grounds that the ambulance company stated they were not liable if one of their employees hit Smith. The suit was dismissed last year, court records state.
The appeals court has reversed the trial's court decision and remanded the case back to Judge Logan. A hearing date has not been set.
Allegations: Smith, who filed the case on his own behalf, alleges that on June 19, 1996, an ambulance worker hit him in the chest when he refused to get on a hospital bed, the ruling states. The ruling refers to the worker only as "John Doe."
The ruling states that the ambulance company believes that if an assault occurred it would have been outside the scope of the employee's employment and the company would not be held liable.
"An employer can be liable for the intentional, malicious acts of an employee performed in the scope of his employment," the ruling states.
The ruling states that before dismissing the lawsuit, the trial court must decide if the "act of hitting Smith in the chest was within the scope" of the ambulance worker's employment.
"Smith was refusing to get onto the hospital bed," the ruling states. "Smith alleges the employee then purposefully hit him in the chest in an attempt to force him onto the hospital bed. While it seems clear from the record that Smith had a special facility for annoying people to the point where they might lash out in a malicious manner, in construing the evidence as required we are forced to conclude that there remains a genuine issue of material fact as to whether, if John Doe shoved Smith, it was done with in the scope of his employment."