Imagine yourself in the following story: when you were in high school, you sometimes worked for your father, a house painter. Once you were in college, you decided to take advantage of that experience to earn some extra money during your summer vacation. You set yourself up as a house-painting business and hired your college roommate to help you out.<\/p>\n
One fine summer day, the two of you were putting a coat of Misty Meadow acrylic latex on the exterior of a two-story Colonial. You were working on the ground floor around the door of the house while your roommate was\u00a0working from scaffolding over the garage. Looking up, you noticed that\u2014despite several warnings\u2014your roommate placed his can of paint at his feet rather than having fixed it to the ladder bracing the platform. You\u00a0were\u00a0about to say something yet again, but it was too late: he accidentally kicked the bucket (so to speak), which then bounced off the homeowner\u2019s red sports car, denting the hood and splattering it with Misty Meadow.<\/p>\n
As luck would have it, the whole episode was\u00a0witnessed by the homeowner\u2019s neighbor, who approached the scene of the disaster just as your roommate climbed down from the scaffold. \u201cMan, you must be dumber than a bag of hammers,\u201d the neighbor said to your roommate, who\u00a0was\u00a0in no mood for unsolicited opinions\u2014and before you knew\u00a0what was happening, he broke the neighbor\u2019s nose with a single well-placed punch.<\/p>\n
The homeowner sued you and your roommate for negligence, and the neighbor sued you and your roommate for assault and battery.<\/p>\n
In this module, we will discuss how our\u00a0legal system shapes the business environment. We will explore how legal situations like this and others could\u00a0impact your business.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t