Facts
On 12 July 1972, a serious accident occurred on the first section of the Betten-Bettmeralp cable car, resulting in 12 fatalities and seriously injuring 18-year-old German Peter Hennemuth at the time. Peter Hennemuth's claims for compensation were granted by the Cantonal Court of Valais on 6 September 1979 for an amount of approximately 230,000 Swiss francs. The German health insurance fund Barmer Ersatzkasse, with which Peter Hennemuth had been insured since 22 February 1974, paid benefits amounting to 126,077.78 DM until the end of 1977. Subsequently, Barmer Ersatzkasse asserted a subrogation claim of 146,083.40 Swiss francs against the Betten-Bettmeralp AG cable car company.
Considerations
According to Swiss private international law, the application of a foreign social insurance subrogation norm is permitted when it complements the applicable private law in the country concerned. The issue of liability must be decided in accordance with the law of the place of the accident, i.e. Swiss law. However, for the German health insurance fund to be able to take action against the responsible party, the latter must have been at fault. If it is a legal person, it must be examined whether a fault has been committed by one of its organs.
The Cantonal Court did not sufficiently examine whether the…