Frank Carra drives a truck for Weide Transport Ltd. (WTL). James Weide is the sole shareholder of WTL. During an otherwise routine journey, a deer jumped onto the highway and caused Carra to swerve out of his lane and onto a strip of gravel that divided northbound and southbound traffic. Carra’s truck collided with a signpost, which was left bent with more than half of the sign was protruding out of the ground. Carra could not remove the post and while he thought about calling the police, he failed to do so. About a day later, Samuel Oke, a driver for Highway Transport, Inc. (HTI) was travelling in the opposite direction on the same highway. The sole shareholder of HTI is Susan Travis. Although the solid yellow lines on the road prohibited such a manoeuvre, Oke attempted to pass a slow moving vehicle by driving on the gravel divider. As he did so, he saw the protruding sign and turned to avoid it. His car hit the slow moving vehicle driven by Prof. Jones. Prof. Jones sues WTL, HTI, James Weide and Susan Travis for negligence. Will Prof. Jones succeed? If so, would James Weide and Susan Travis be liable or just their companies?
Using IRAC method to illustrate the answer.
