Donald Muir, Sr. v. Metro Auto Sales, Inc.

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
• Decided: July 31, 2024
• Docket: 23-1969
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

USCA4 Appeal: 23-1969 Doc: 32 Filed: 07/31/2024 Pg: 1 of 3

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 23-1969

DONALD MUIR, SR.,

Plaintiff – Appellant,

and

SAED QATAWNEH; AMIR MASHAQBEH, d/b/a Jordan Towing, Inc.,

Defendants – Appellants,

v.

METRO AUTO SALES, INC.,

Defendant – Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore. Stephanie A. Gallager, District Judge. (1:21-cv-01794-SAG)

Submitted: March 21, 2024 Decided: July 31, 2024

Before WYNN and BENJAMIN, Circuit Judges, and MOTZ, Senior Circuit Judge.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

ON BRIEF: Paul M. Finamore, Halle P. Gray, PESSIN KATZ LAW, P.A., Columbia, Maryland; Paul D. Bekman, Aryeh M. Rabinowitz, BEKMAN, MARDER, HOPPER, MALARKEY & PERLIN, LLC, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellants. Margaret Fonshell USCA4 Appeal: 23-1969 Doc: 32 Filed: 07/31/2024 Pg: 2 of 3

Ward, Megan G. Freeman, DOWNS WARD BENDER HERZOG & KINTIGH, P.A., Hunt Valley, Maryland, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

2 USCA4 Appeal: 23-1969 Doc: 32 Filed: 07/31/2024 Pg: 3 of 3

PER CURIAM:

In this negligence action, Plaintiff Donald Muir, Sr., Defendant Saed Qatawneh, and

Defendant Amir Mashaqbeh appeal the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor

of Defendant Metro Auto Sales, Inc. We review the grant of summary judgment de novo,

viewing the facts and all reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving

party. See Pledger v. Lynch, 5 F.4th 511, 524 (4th Cir. 2021).

We have reviewed the record and find no reversible error. We conclude that Muir

offered insufficient evidence of control for a jury to find that a master-servant relationship

existed between Metro Auto Sales, Inc., and Saed Qatawneh at the time of Muir’s accident.

See Green v. H&R Block, Inc., 735 A.2d 1039, 1048 (Md. 1999); Brady v. Ralph Parsons

Co., 520 A.2d 717, 730 n.26 (Md. 1987) (“A person who contracts . . . to deliver something

to another, but who is not acting as a fiduciary for the other, is a non-agent independent

contractor.” (cleaned up)); Whitehead v. Safway Steel Prods., Inc., 497 A.2d 803, 809 (Md.

1985) (holding that the “decisive” or “controlling” factor in a master-servant relationship

is “whether the [principal] has the right to control and direct the [agent] in the performance

of the work and in the manner in which the work is to be done” (cleaned up)).

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of

Defendant Metro Auto Sales, Inc. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and

legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument

would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED