Phelps v. Brown

STEWART, Judge.

Appellant, Eugene Phelps, was employed by appellee, Colyer Brown, at the latter’s junk yard near Somerset. Phelps was instructed by Brown to start a pickup truck which the latter contemplated selling to a third party. The truck would not start by the conventional means, so Phelps primed the carburetor with gasoline from a small can. A backfire ignited the gasoline and Phelps, seeing no one on the other side of the truck, tossed the flaming can over the hood. The burning contents struck one Lonnie Mincey, as he walked from behind the cab, and severe burns were suffered by him.…