Steve Sheridan, Jennifer Olson, and Olivia Moe won summary judgment for a general contractor in a personal injury lawsuit arising out of the plaintiff’s allegations that he contracted a severe gastrointestinal illness caused by exposure to infectious bacteria from poultry while he was working on a construction project at a poultry processing plant.
The plaintiff – an employee of an electrical contractor hired directly by the plant owner – contended that the general contractor breached duties to warn or protect all workers at the site from risks of harm. Ms. Moe persuaded the Court the general construction contractor owed no duty to warn or protect an employee of a co-contractor from the risks of biological hazards from exposure to poultry where the general contractor did not create the hazard, did not control the co-contractor’s work, did not own or possess the premises, and had no superior knowledge of the risk of poultry-related illnesses.