Can a third party be held liable for tortfeasance under section 3856 and section 3860 of the California Civil Code?

Sections 3856 and 3860 make it possible for a third party to be held liable "for all the wrong his tortfeasance brought about" (Smith v. County of Los Angeles, 276 Cal.App.2d 156, 162, 81 Cal.Rptr. 120), regardless of whether it is the employee or employer who brings suit. To the extent the damages an employee recovers from a third party duplicate the benefits which the employee has already received from the employer, the employee's recovery provides a fund from which the employer may draw. (See 3856, subds. (b) and (c).) Taken together with the notice, intervention, and consolidation procedures set out in section 3853, these statutes attempt to insure that "(i)n either case, single or joint plaintiffs, there results but the one total action, and the defendant is put to his defense but once with the totality of recovery for his tortfeasance in issue." (Id., at p. 164, 81 Cal.Rptr. 120 (italics in original).)