The Paris Court of Appeal has ruled that a man’s death during sex on a business trip was a workplace accident and said that his family is entitled to be compensated, the BBC reports. The suit goes back to 2013, when Xavier X, who is referred to as an engineer by the British broadcaster or as a safety technician by Euronews, died from cardiac arrest in a hotel room, where he had sex with a stranger. As the tragic event happened while the man was on a business trip, the national social security provider insisted that the man’s employer, railway company TSO, based near Paris, was liable.
TSO protested the decision, insisting that everything happened after working hours and not even in the room, booked for the poor man. It branded his unfortunate date “an extramarital relationship with a complete stranger", even though the court did not state the deceased’s marital status, and argued that he had “knowingly interrupted his business trip for a reason dictated by personal interest, independent of his employment”, According to the company, his death could not be attributed to work.
The French court, however, ruled otherwise. A court spokesman referred to the French social security code, stipulating that “a work accident is an accident that occurs in the course of work”.
“In this particular case, the employee was on a business trip, which includes the work time devoted to the business trip (time of travel, working time during the day, rest time during the trip). That also covers the nighttime he has to be away from his home”, he said, as cited by Euronews.
He pointed out that an employee remains under an employer’s authority until “he’s shown that he has interrupted for an activity that cannot be considered part of everyday life”. And having sex is “part of everyday life”, as the judges ruled. The fact that everything happened outside the man’s room does not remove him from the TSO’s authority.
Although the death itself was a sad event, the unusual court ruling prompted a wave of jokes on Twitter.
Many did not think the fact this news came from France was a coincidence.