Mississippi: Fatal Shooting During Firearms Training Session Does Not Support Tort Action Against Employer

A Mississippi appellate court affirmed a state trial court's decision granting summary judgment to the state, as employer, on workers' compensation exclusive remedy grounds following the fatal shooting of a state Gaming Commission employee during a firearms training exercise. During the exercise, the deceased worker took on the role of "an aggressor" and came toward the highly trained instructor, who drew his service weapon and fired a single, fatal shot into the worker's chest. The appellate court agreed that the evidence supported a finding of negligence--even gross negligence--but did not rise to the level of intentional injury required to defeat the exclusive remedy defense. There was no evidence that the instructor actually intended to injure the deceased employee.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See In the Estate of Gorman v. State, [2020 Miss. LEXIS 506 (Dec. 17, 2020)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 103.03.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law

For a more detailed discussion of the case, see

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