Can a jury find a defendant negligent yet assign that defendant zero percent of the fault? Coombs v. Natural Choice Explained

Background and facts

In the summer of 2016, a backhoe operator clearing thistle on property in Box Elder County ignited a wildfire that consumed more than 20,000 acres, including land owned by a group of ranchers and landowners. The landowners sued both NWR Ltd Partnership, which owned the property, and Natural Choice, LLC, which leased it and sent the operator. After a nine-day trial, the jury found that both defendants were negligent and that each defendant’s negligence was a substantial factor in causing the landowners’ damages. The jury also found Natural Choice to be the alter ego of NWR. Yet on the fault-allocation question, the jury attributed 100% of the fault to NWR and 0% to Natural Choice — and then awarded punitive damages against both. The trial court denied NWR’s rule 49 motion for a new trial, reasoning that the alter ego finding reconciled the apparent inconsistency. Both defendants appealed.

Key legal issues

Two issues were before the Utah Court of Appeals. First, whether the special verdict was irreconcilably inconsistent requiring a new trial. Second — addressed as guidance on remand — whether Landowners had sufficiently pleaded a vicarious liability claim against Natural Choice under Utah’s notice-pleading standard when the amended complaint referenced “agents or employs” but never named the operator by name and never used the words “respondeat superior.”

Court’s analysis and holding

The court reviewed both issues under the correctness standard. On the inconsistent verdict, the court explained that Utah’s comparative fault scheme under Utah Code § 78B-5-817(2) defines “fault” as any actionable breach of duty proximately causing or contributing to damages — meaning a party found negligent and a substantial cause of harm necessarily bears some percentage of fault. The jury’s simultaneous findings that Natural Choice was negligent, substantially caused the damages, and yet bore zero percent fault were legally irreconcilable. The alter ego finding did not save the verdict: under the alter ego doctrine, the alter ego remains liable to the same extent as the underlying entity, and a finding of alter ego “merely furnishes a means” to reach a second party — it does not erase the first party’s fault. Because the verdict could not be harmonized, the court vacated it and remanded for a new trial.

On the pleading issue, the court held that Utah’s notice-pleading standard under Utah R. Civ. P. 8 required only that the amended complaint fairly apprise Natural Choice of the nature of the claim. References to “agents or employs” starting the fire with the backhoe were sufficient. The court also noted that Natural Choice’s own initial disclosures identified the operator as someone “working for Natural Choice on the day of the fire” and that Natural Choice designated him as its rule 30(b)(6) representative — demonstrating actual notice and negating any claim of prejudice.

Practice implications

This decision reinforces two critical points for Utah trial and appellate practitioners. First, when a verdict inconsistency surfaces while the jury remains empaneled, counsel should immediately move under rule 49 to return the jury for clarification rather than relying on post-discharge harmonization — clarification is far more efficient and avoids the cost of retrial. Second, the decision confirms that alter ego liability is additive, not substitutive: an alter ego finding transfers fault upward to a parent or related entity but does not eliminate the underlying entity’s own comparative fault. Practitioners structuring verdict forms in multi-defendant cases involving alter ego or agency theories should draft questions that clearly sequence causation, fault allocation, and derivative liability to prevent juror confusion of the kind that produced an irreconcilable verdict here.