High Court considers scope of employers’ liability for workplace violence

This article was co-authored by Arsema Mulat, Litigation Assistant.

The well known vicarious liability case of Mohamud v Morrison Supermarkets plc [2016] previously held that an employer was liable for the violence committed by it’s employee against a customer. In the recent case of Evan S v Magiboards Limited [2025] the Court was asked to consider whether an employer was liable for the violence committed by an employee against another employee.

Background

The claimant was involved in a physical altercation at work where a colleague, Mr B, punched him in the face fracturing his jaw.

Prior to this incident the claimant alleged there had been at least four previous occasions of “force, threats of force, verbal confrontation and abuse, intimidation, aggression or threats of physical confrontation” by Mr B towards the claimant and other colleagues, some of which allegedly took place in front of a supervisor and some of which were allegedly reported to a supervisor. On the day of the index incident it was further alleged that in the hour leading up to the incident Mr B was agitated and complaining about the claimant to the supervisor saying “[i]f you don’t stop him, I will”. The claimant alleged that some arguments, including on the day of the incident, related to the claimant wearing an earpiece and using a radio at work contrary to the unwritten workplace rules against use of the same.

The supervisor denied knowledge of the prior incidents, as did the managing director. It was instead advanced by the defendant that the claimant had confirmed in appraisals that everything was going well and queries were raised as to the genuineness of some of the claimant’s alleged events. 

Mr B and the claimant were dismissed for gross misconduct as a result of the incident. Mr B was subsequently acquitted in criminal proceedings.

The claimant alleged his employer was:

1. Primarily liable for failing to take sufficient care of him at work.
2. Vicariously liable for the actions of Mr B.

Primary liability

The claimant alleged it was reasonably foreseeable that Mr B would attack him due to the previous incidents. By the supervisor not taking steps to deal with Mr B, the claimant alleged the defendant was primarily liable for failing to take reasonable care of him whilst he was at work.

The defendant argued that there were no previous incidents or that if there were any, violence was not involved, meaning that they had no prior warning of Mr B’s attack to enable them to take any steps to avoid it. 

The Court found the claimant an unconvincing witness and considered that the prior incidents did not occur. They also considered that the alleged immediate threat by Mr B to sort it out himself did not occur. As such the earliest possible warning of potential violence by Mr B was when Mr B approached the claimant immediately before the punch, but that even then the claimant admitted that as Mr B was walking over he himself did not believe he would be punched. In light of this the defendant could not have predicted the punch and there were no measures that they could have taken to prevent the assault. The Court held the defendant was not primarily liable.

Vicarious liability

Vicarious liability required the claimant to establish that:

1. There was an employer/employee relationship between the defendant and Mr B (accepted).
2. There was a sufficiently close connection between that relationship and the action of Mr B punching the claimant (disputed).

The defendant argued that the fact the incident occurred in the workplace was insufficient to say there was a sufficiently close connection. There were no employment aims given to Mr B which meant an assault was likely, the nature of the business did not give rise to any special risk of assault by colleagues, there was no general friction  inherent in the workplace and no power conferred on Mr B over the claimant.

The claimant advanced that Mr B had an obligation, as all employees did, to observe workplace rules and to raise a complaint when others were not following them. It was also asserted by the claimant that it was within Mr B’s rights to enforce the rules when his supervisor did nothing about it. This was argued to be enough to say there was a sufficiently close connection between the rules and Mr B’s conduct.

The Court rejected the claimant’s suggestion that Mr B’s actions were in furtherance of the defendant’s interests regarding the rules. Mr B was not the claimant’s supervisor and his actions were entirely unconnected to the workplace beyond the fact that they occurred in the workplace against a fellow employee. As such the defendant was not vicariously liable.

Comment

The defendant highlighted that since the decision in Mohamud v Morrison Supermarkets plc there had been an “elegant judicial rowing backwards” of the sufficient connection test, particularly noting the Supreme Court decision in WM Morrison Supermarkets pls v Various Claimants [2020]. This case held that there was not a sufficiently close connection between the disgruntled employees mass data breach which was motivated by a vendetta to harm the company rather than a furtherance of its aims.

Similar recent decisions can be seen in cases such as Chell v Tarmac Cement and Lime Limited [2022] (insufficient connection between work and a prank by an employee on another), Ali v Luton BC [2022] (insufficient connection between work and misuse of personal data by an employee) and Trustees of the Barry Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses (Appellant) v BXB (Respondent) [2023] (insufficient connection between position of an elder and the rape of a congregation member when not carrying out activities for the church). The decision in Evan S seems to be a continuation of the courts restricting the scope of vicarious liability and confirms that employers are not simply liable for an incident just because it happened in the workplace.