Wis JI-Civil 4035

Question inquires whether, at the times material hereto, was acting

within the scope of his or her employment as a servant of.

This question, in effect, asks you to determine whether, at the times material

hereto, was within the field of action of his or her employment or whether he or she

deviated or departed therefrom, for personal or other reasons.

A servant is within the scope of his or her employment when he or she is

performing work or rendering services he or she was engaged to perform and render

within the time and space limits of his or her authority and is actuated by a purpose to

serve his or her master in doing what he or she is doing. He or she is within the scope of

his or her employment when he or she is performing work or rendering services in

obedience to the express orders or direction of his or her master, or doing that which is

warranted within the terms of his or her express or implied authority, considering the

nature of the services required, the instructions which he or she has received, and the

circumstances under which his or her work is being done or the services are being

rendered.

A servant is outside the scope of employment when he or she deviates or steps

aside from the prosecution of his or her master’s business for the purpose of doing an act

or rendering a service intended to accomplish an independent purpose of his or her own,

or for some other reason or purpose, not related to the business of the master.

Such deviation or stepping aside must be sufficient to amount to a departure from

the master’s services for purposes entirely personal to him or her or for some person

other than the master.

Such deviation or stepping aside from the master’s business may be momentary

and slight, measured in terms of space of time, but if it involves a change of mental

attitude or purpose in serving his or her personal interests, or the interests of another,

instead of his or her master’s, his or her conduct falls outside the scope of his or her

employment.

You will carefully consider and weigh all the credible evidence and the reasonable

inferences from the evidence bearing on this inquiry, and, if you are satisfied that the

servant was within the scope of his or her employment, as here defined for you,

you will answer the question “yes”; otherwise you will answer it “no.”