In a decision with sweeping implications for tort liability and corporate defendants, the Texas Supreme Court has drawn a line in the sand on the limits of employer responsibility. In Werner v. Blake ___ S.W. 3d ___ (Tex. 2025)(Cause No. 23-0493), the court reversed a $100 million verdict, holding that an employer cannot be held liable, directly or indirectly, when its employee's actions are not a proximate cause of the alleged harm. The ruling reinforces long-standing principles of Texas tort law, clarifying that claims for negligent training, supervision, or hiring cannot stand on their own when the employee's conduct is not legally linked to the injury. This decision provides important guidance for companies facing high-stakes litigation based on policy failures, operational judgments, or indirect theories of liability, particularly in transportation, logistics, and other risk-intensive industries.
Factual Background of the Case
On December 30, 2014, Trey Salinas was driving his Ford F-350 on Interstate-20 eastbound near Odessa, Texas, with four passengers including Jennifer Blake and her four children. Earlier that day, the National Weather Service issued and later updated a winter storm advisory warning of freezing rain and dangerously icy road conditions. At approximately 4:30 p.m., Salinas lost control of his vehicle while traveling at an estimated 50 to 60 mph. Within seconds, his pickup crossed the 42-foot-wide grassy median and entered westbound traffic, colliding with a Werner Enterprises 18-wheeler driven by Shiraz Ali, a driver-in-training, with his trainer resting in the sleep berth of the truck.
Ali testified that upon seeing the oncoming truck, he braked immediately. Plaintiffs' expert confirmed Ali's reaction was appropriate under the circumstances. As a result of the crash, seven-year-old Zachary Blake was killed and his older sister Brianna, rendered a permanent quadriplegic. Jennifer and Nathan Blake suffered traumatic brain and other serious injuries. Salinas was treated and released from the hospital a few hours after the accident.
Evidence presented at trial painted a grim picture of the weather and driving conditions. Multiple crashes had occurred on the eastbound and westbound 1-20 in the 90 minutes before the Blake collision, including another cross-median accident just 4.5 miles away. First responders described the roads as "a skating rink." Other truck drivers had pulled off the road entirely. Nonetheless, Ali testified that he did not believe slower driving was necessary and maintained that his truck had good traction. Trial evidence showed that in the two hours proceeding the crash, Ali's speed averaged 60 mph. At the moment of impact, the truck was traveling between 43 and 45 mph.
Jennifer Blake, individually and on behalf of her children, sued Werner Enterprises and Ali. Werner admitted vicarious liability for Ali's actions. The jury apportioned fault as follows: 70% to Werner (excluding Ali), 14% to Ali, and 16% to Salinas. The Blake family was awarded over $89 million in damages.
After settling with Salinas, the plaintiffs received a credit, and the trial court entered judgment against Werner and Ali. On appeal, Werner and Ali challenged several aspects of the case, including the sufficiency of the evidence on negligence and proximate cause, employer liability for negligent training, the jury charge, apportionment findings, and the award of future medical expenses.
The Court of Appeals affirmed. Werner and Ali petitioned the Texas Supreme Court for review, arguing that any negligence by Ali was not a proximate cause of the accident and that Werner could not be held liable under the facts presented. The Court granted the petition.
Revisiting Proximate Cause
In reviewing Werner and Ali's appeal, the Texas Supreme Court first addressed the critical threshold issue of proximate cause. Specifically, whether Ali's alleged negligence was a legal cause of the plaintiff's injuries.
Proximate cause has long anchored liability in Texas tort law. The court reaffirmed its foundational principle that legal responsibility attaches only to those causes that are proximate to the injury. Remote causes are insufficient to meet this standard. The test for proximate cause consists of two components:
- Cause in fact, and
- Foreseeability. Pediatrics Cool Care v. Thompson, 649 S.W.3d 152, 158 (Tex. 2022).
The cause-in-fact element itself includes two parts:
- But-for" causation, and
- "substantial factor" causation. Id.
A defendant's conduct satisfies the "but-for" standard if the injury would not have occurred without the defendant's action or inaction. Gunn v. McCoy, 554 S.W.3d 645, 658 (Tex. 2018). In Werner the Texas Supreme Court emphasized that a Plaintiff must not only prove but-for causation but also substantial factor causation.
The court highlighted the importance of distinguishing between conduct that simply sets the stage for harm and conduct that actually bears legal responsibility for it. Drawing from the Restatement (Second) of Torts §431 cmt.a, the court emphasized that "substantial" is used to denote the fact that the defendant’s conduct has such an effect in producing the harm as to lead reasonable men to regard it as a cause, using that word in the popular sense, in which there always lurks the idea of responsibility, rather than in the so-called “philosophic sense,” which includes every one of the great number of events without which any happening would not have occurred. See also Lear v. Perez, 819 S.W.2d 470, 472 (Tex. 1991). If the defendant's actions only created the background conditions under which the injury occurred, without actually contributing to the harm in a substantial way, then proximate cause is not established as a matter of law. Stanfield v. Neubeum, 494 S.W.3d 90, 97 (Tex. 2016).
Proximate cause limits liability to those actors whose conduct played a sufficiently direct and significant role in causing the injury. It excludes those whose actions merely enabled the possibility of harm, without truly contributing to the event in a way that justifies legal accountability.
The Jury's Finding on Causation Rejected: Ali's Conduct Not a Substantial Factor
At trial, the jury found that Ali's negligent driving as a substantial factor in causing the Blake family's injuries. On appeal, Werner and Ali argued that this finding was unsupported as a matter of law. To overturn a jury verdict, they had to successfully demonstrate that no reasonable juror could have reached that conclusion. City of Keller v. Wilson, 168 S.W.3d 802, 823 (Tex. 2005). The Texas Supreme Court concluded that Werner and Ali met this high standard. Although the jury charge correctly distinguished between but-for causation and substantial-factor causation, the court held that under a proper legal understanding of proximate cause, no reasonable juror could have found that Ali's conduct was the legal cause of the plaintiff's injuries.
The plaintiffs argued that Ali's speed, estimated to be about 60 mph on icy roads, was negligent and if he had been traveling slower, the accident may not have occurred. They emphasized that Ali was aware of the hazardous conditions, the risks of passenger vehicles losing control, and the danger posed by 18 wheelers. They asserted that Ali's speed exacerbated the severity of the injuries, qualifying his action as a proximate cause of the plaintiffs' injuries. Both the trial court and the court of appeals accepted this theory, focusing on expert testimony that the accident could have been avoided or mitigated had Ali driven more cautiously.
However, the Supreme Court drew a critical distinction. While Ali's speed may satisfy a but-for causation standard, it was not a substantial factor in causing the accident. The court emphasized that proximate cause demands more than proof that a defendant's conduct created a condition that made injury possible. Instead, it requires proof that the conduct actually brought about the harm in a legally significant way. Stanfield v. Neubaum, 494 S.W.3d 90, 97 (Tex. 2016); IHS Cedars Treatment Ctr. v. Mason, 143 S.W.3d 794, 799 (Tex. 2004).
In this case, the sole proximate cause of the accident was Salinas losing control of his F-350 and crossing a 42-foot median into oncoming traffic in a matter of seconds. Nothing Ali did caused Salina's truck to lose control, veer off course, or enter westbound lanes. Ali's presence and speed, even if negligent, were merely incidental to the crash.
The court acknowledged that different speeds or positions could have changed the outcome but analogized such hypotheticals to countless other "what if" scenarios that cannot form the basis of legal liability. Substantial-factor causation does not assign responsibility based on hypothetical alternatives.
Ultimately, the court held that Ali's conduct was too attenuated from the actual cause of the accident to support liability. His presence on the road and his speed furnished the condition for the harm but did not proximately cause it.
Court Distinguishes the Biggers case and Rejects Proximate Cause
The plaintiffs relied on the Texas Supreme Court's 1957 decision in Biggers v. Continental Bus System, 303 S.W.2d 359 (Tex. 1957), where a vehicle slowed near a bridge and triggered a chain reaction involving three southbound cars, one of which was pushed into the oncoming path of a bus traveling at excessive speed. In that case, the court held it was foreseeable that a driver in his own lane might nonetheless be involved in a collision due to another driver's unexpected entry into his path.
However, the court in the current case distinguished Biggers on both legal and factual grounds. Legally, Biggers focused on foreseeability and but-for causation, whereas today's proximate cause analysis emphasizes whether the defendant's conduct was substantial factor in causing the harm. Though foreseeability and substantial-factor causation are related concepts, they serve different purposes. Foreseeability addresses whether the risk was reasonably anticipated, while substantial factor asks whether the defendant's conduct was meaningfully responsible for the harm.
Factually, Biggers involved vehicles traveling close together on a narrow, wet, two-lane road in 1951. The present case involved a modern interstate highway divided by a 42-foot grassy median. The likelihood of a vehicle crossing into oncoming traffic on a narrow road is markedly higher than on a divided highway.
Moreover, timing was key. In Biggers, the oncoming car was in the bus's lane for 3.5 seconds before impact, allowing time for the jury to consider whether the bus driver could have avoided the crash. In contrast, the expert in the current case testified that that the errant vehicle crossed the median and collided with the defendant's truck in under two seconds, offering virtually no time to react. This timeline most closely resembles the fact in Baumler v. Hazelwood, 347 S.W.2d 560 (1961), where the court held that speed alone was not a proximate cause when the driver had no time to avoid the crash.
Ultimately, the court emphasized a commonsense principle that drivers on modern divided highways rely on other drivers to maintain control of their vehicles and stay in their lanes. It found that legal blame lies with the driver who loses control, not the one struck without warning. Thus, the court concluded that Ali's conduct was not a substantial factor in causing the accident. Salina's loss of control was the sole proximate cause.
Werner Cannot be Held Liable Without a Finding of Proximate Cause Against its Driver
Having found that Ali's driving was not a proximate cause of the accident, the court next addressed whether Ali's employer, Werner Enterprises, could still be held liable. The answer was no. The jury imposed (1) derivative liability for negligently training and supervising Ali; and (2) direct liability for independently creating dangerous conditions by assigning an inexperienced driver to a hazardous route.
The court of appeals upheld both verdicts, but only after concluding that Ali's negligence caused the accident, a conclusion the Texas Supreme Court now rejected. Under Texas law, claims for negligent training or supervision cannot stand unless the employee's own negligence proximately caused the injury. Since Ali's driving was not a proximate cause of the crash, Werner cannot be held secondarily liable for failing to train or supervise him.
Direct Liability Theory Also Fails
The plaintiffs also argued that Werner was directly liable for sending an unqualified trainee, Ali, into dangerous winter conditions without adequate support or weather updates. The court of appeals agreed, relying in part on the Texas Supreme Court's recent ruling in United Rentals N. Am., Inc. v. Evans, 668 S.W.3d 627, 639 (Tex. 2023), which held that companies can be liable for taking affirmative actions that create highway hazards. However, the Supreme Court clarified that this "direct" liability still depends on the premise that Ali's unsafe driving contributed to the crash. If Ali was not responsible, Werner cannot be held liable for putting him on the road, regardless of the company's alleged safety failures.
Ultimately, every theory of Werner's liability hinged in Ali's conduct. Without a finding that Ali's driving proximately caused the accident, no legal basis remains to hold Werner liable, whether under direct or derivative theories. As such the court reversed the judgment against Werner as well.
Conclusion
The court's reversal of the judgment against Werner underscores a critical legal boundary, even in cases involving tragic outcomes and potentially flawed corporate policies. Employer liability cannot be imposed in the absence of proximate cause by the employee. The decision is a clear reaffirmation of Texas tort law principles, placing a necessary check on attempts to extend liability through indirect or policy-based theories that lack a casual foundation. Going forward, defense practitioners can look to this ruling as a strong precedent when challenging speculative or attenuated claims of corporate responsibility.