Liability for an independent contractor's allegedly negligent acts.

The corporate defendant was a newspaper distributor which entered into a contract with The New York Times to distribute its papers. The individual defendant was the corporate defendant's independent contractor who had sole responsibility and control over the manner and means of delivering the papers. The First Department dismissed the complaint as against the corporate defendant, in Duhe v. Midence, which was decided on February 7, 2008. The court said that the distributorship did not exercise sufficient control over the actual delivery process to raise a triable issue of fact as to whether it was vicariously liable for the individual defendant's acts.

Practice point: General supervisory control is insufficient to impose liability on a corporate defendant for the acts and omissions of an independent contractor.