Teal v. E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co.

Richard Teal (plaintiff), an employee of an independent contractor, Daniel Construction, was working at a DuPont (defendant) plant dismantling equipment above a pit accessible only by a wall-mounted ladder, and he fell from that ladder to the pit floor. The ladder did not meet an OSHA regulation requiring at least seven inches of clearance between a ladder and the wall. Teal sued DuPont for negligence and requested a jury instruction on negligence per se based on the OSHA violation, but the district court refused to give the instruction, and the jury found for DuPont; Teal appealed.