West v. East Tennessee Pioneer Oil Co.

After a station clerk refused to sell beer to visibly drunk Tarver, he nonetheless bought three dollars of gas, and off-duty employees who could plainly see he was intoxicated helped activate the pump for him; he then drove off without headlights into the wrong lane and, less than three miles later, hit the Wests (plaintiffs) head-on. An expert testified Tarver would have run out of gas short of the accident site without that final purchase. The Wests sued the station owner (defendant) for negligently selling gas to and helping fuel a visibly intoxicated driver; the trial court granted summary judgment on multiple grounds, the court of appeals reversed on the core negligence theory, and further appeal followed.

Whether a gas station employee owes a duty of care not to sell gasoline to an obviously intoxicated driver and help pump it into his vehicle.