Arp v. Maryland Casualty Company

170 So. 2d 166
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedFebruary 24, 1965
Docket1577
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 170 So. 2d 166 (Arp v. Maryland Casualty Company) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Arp v. Maryland Casualty Company, 170 So. 2d 166 (La. Ct. App. 1965).

Opinion

170 So.2d 166 (1964)

Robert Crawford ARP
v.
MARYLAND CASUALTY COMPANY.

No. 1577.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fourth Circuit.

December 7, 1964.
Rehearing Denied January 11, 1965.
Writ Refused February 24, 1965.

*167 Jerome P. Halford, New Orleans, for plaintiff-appellant.

Marian Mayer Berkett, of Deutsch, Kerrigan & Stiles, New Orleans, for defendant-appellee.

Before REGAN, CHASEZ and HALL, JJ.

CHASEZ, Judge.

Plaintiff filed suit for total and permanent disability benefits under the Louisiana Workmen's Compensation Act as the result of an alleged injury which occurred on a barge moored in the Mississippi River. The defendant is the compensation insurer of the plaintiff's employer. Defendant filed exceptions to the jurisdiction, and of no cause of action; the exceptions were based on the contention that plaintiff's exclusive remedy is the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Act because his injury was sustained on navigable waters. The court upheld the exception of lack of jurisdiction and dismissed plaintiff's suit. Plaintiff appeals from this judgment.

A deposition of plaintiff was submitted by the defendant to support the exception; in opposition the plaintiff submitted an affidavit. These were properly considered by the Court because the issue of jurisdiction was not clearly presented on the face of the pleadings.

The plaintiff was employed by Electronic Services, Inc., as an electronic technician or repairman. His job consisted of working on electronic equipment for boats, offices and motor vehicles. This work required him to make service calls on boats and repair the equipment on the spot at times. On the night the alleged accident occurred he was on quite an unusual mission. His employer directed him to remove certain electronic equipment from the tug Seahorse which was docked at the Federal Barge Line Wharf in New Orleans, on the Mississippi River. The owners of the vessel had not paid for the equipment; plaintiff's employer, *168 fearing that the vessel would be seized by other creditors of the vessel owner, wished to repossess the equipment. Four barges were lashed to the tug and lay between the tug and the wharf. While plaintiff was lifting some of the equipment on the barge next to the Seahorse he allegedly sustained a hernia. Both parties concede that plaintiff was over navigable water when the alleged injury was sustained.

The plaintiff contends that this case is a proper case for the application of the "twilight zone"[1] doctrine, giving the plaintiff the right to bring suit in state court if he chooses. The defendant contends that the twilight zone doctrine has lost its validity and in the alternative if the doctrine retains validity that it has no application in this case.

We see no point in a lengthy review of the twilight zone doctrine for this has been done often and adequately in the past. The defendant's main contention is that the case of Calbeck v. Travelers Insurance Company, 370 U.S. 114, 82 S.Ct. 1196, 8 L.Ed.2d 368 (1962), emasculated the local concern doctrine and by the same token the twilight zone doctrine. We believe that the doctrine still survives. In Calbeck the Court commented on the Davis case which established the doctrine:

"In Davis v. Department of Labor, 317 U.S. 249, 62 S.Ct. 225, 87 L.Ed. 246, a structural steel worker engaged in dismantling a bridge across a navigable river was cutting and stowing dismantled steel in a barge when he fell into the river from the barge and was drowned. His dependents sought compensation under the state act and this Court held that it could be applied. The result was not predicated on the ground that the employment was `maritime but local,' and so outside the coverage of the Longshoremen's Act. Rather the Court viewed the case as in a `twilight zone' where the applicability of state law was `extremely difficult' to determine, and resolved the doubt, of course, in favor of the constitutionality of the application of state law. At the same time, the Court indicated that compensation might also have been sought under the Longshoremen's Act and that an award under that Act in the very same circumstances would have been supportable, pointing out that the Act adopts `the Jensen line of demarcation.' 317 U.S., at 256, 62 S.Ct. 225. * * *"

We do not read this statement as an overruling of Davis. We feel that the Calbeck case established that if an injury occurs over navigable water the Deputy Commissioner may take jurisdiction even though under the old "local concern" doctrine he would have been precluded from doing so. It should be noted that Calbeck did not hold that if the injury happened over navigable water a state court could not apply its local compensation act.

In support of our position that the twilight zone survives, we call attention to Holland v. Harrison Bros. Dry Dock and Repair Yard, Inc., 306 F.2d 369 (5th Cir.1962). In this case a workman while on dry land but under a marine railway on which a barge was being repaired sustained an injury to his back. The Deputy Commissioner took jurisdiction of the case; the Fifth Circuit sustained his jurisdiction on the ground that the case was within the twilight zone. The Court in so holding discussed the twilight zone doctrine in light of Calbeck and concluded it was still valid:

"Although the [Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers'] Act chartered a course for thousands of workers, many weary and frustrated litigants were unable to navigate the legal complexities of state and maritime jurisdiction, misjudged their course, and pursued the wrong remedy until after prescription had barred appropriate relief. In 1942 *169 the Supreme Court, in part at least to reduce such instances of hardship, recognized a `twilight zone' embracing cases involving mixed elements of land and maritime jurisdiction where an appellate court would leave to the fact-finder the decision whether jurisdiction existed for the remedy sought. Davis v. Department of Labor and Industries of Washington, 1942, 317 U.S. 249, 63 S.Ct. 225, 87 L.Ed. 246. In Davis a structural steel worker engaged in dismantling a bridge across a navigable river was stowing dismantled steel in a barge when he fell from the barge and was drowned. * * *"
* * * * * *
"After Davis, two per curiam decisions indicated that the Supreme Court intended the `twilight zone' `to include within a wide circle of doubt all waterfront cases involving aspects pertaining both to the land and to the sea where a reasonable argument can be made either way.' Moore's Case, 1948, 323 Mass. 162, 80 N.E.2d 478, 481, aff'd, Bethlehem Steel Co. v. Moore, 1948, 335 U.S. 874, 69 S.Ct. 239, 93 L.Ed. 417 and Baskin v. Industrial Acc. Comm., 1950, 340 U.S. 886, 71 S.Ct. 204, 95 L.Ed. 643 [sic], 338 U.S. 854, 70 S.Ct.

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170 So. 2d 166, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/arp-v-maryland-casualty-company-lactapp-1965.