Bischoff v. American Car & Foundry Co.

157 N.W. 34, 190 Mich. 229, 1916 Mich. LEXIS 865
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 30, 1916
DocketDocket No. 69
StatusPublished
Cited by21 cases

This text of 157 N.W. 34 (Bischoff v. American Car & Foundry Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bischoff v. American Car & Foundry Co., 157 N.W. 34, 190 Mich. 229, 1916 Mich. LEXIS 865 (Mich. 1916).

Opinions

Person, J.

On the 16th day of September, 1913, the claimant was, and for more than a year had been, employed by the American Car & Foundry Company as a molder. In the forenoon of that day his right hand was caught in the gear wheels of an electric crane and so crushed as to require the amputation of the larger portion of it. The committee of arbitration appointed under Act No. 10, Extra Session 1912 (2 Comp. Laws 1915, § 5423 et seq.), having found the claimant entitled to compensation, and the amount of such compensation having been increased on appeal to the Industrial Accident Board, the employer brings the case here for review, insisting that the injury re[231]*231ceived by the employee did not arise “out of and in the course of his employment,” that it was the result of his. own “intentional and wilful misconduct,” and that the compensation allowed is excessive.

As this act provides compensation only for such injuries as are received in the course of the employment, and then only when they grow out of the employment, and as injuries received outside the employment are not within the provisions of the act at all, it must follow that the “intentional and wilful misconduct” which operates to debar the employee from the compensation which he might otherwise receive refers to such misconduct within the scope of his employment. If the injury to the employe was not received “in the course of his employment,” it is immaterial whether it was caused by his “intentional and wilful misconduct” or not.

The first question therefore to be determined is whether the injury received by claimant arose out of and in the course of his employment. And in this connection the findings of fact made by the Industrial Accident Board and returned to this court, being well supported by the evidence, are controlling so far as they go. Such findings are as follows:

“(1) On the 16th day of September, 1913, George Bischoff, claimant and appellee, was employed as a car wheel molder at the Detroit plant of the American Car & Foundry Company, a New Jersey corporation, engaged in the manufacture of cars, car wheels, etc. He was at that time 29 years of age, and had been in the employ of the appellant 3% years, 2 of which he had spent working as helper to a molder, and iy% of which he spent working as a molder.
“(2) The foundry in which appellee worked at the time, of the accident was divided into 14 ‘floors’ about 9 feet apart. Each ‘floor’ consisted of a row of molds, 25 molds in length, located on one level or general ground floor of the foundry. A molder was in charge of each one of these ‘floors.’ At a distance of about [232]*23215 feet above each ‘floor’ was located a crane, the motive power of which was electricity; 240 volts being required to operate it. Appellee was in charge of a ‘floor’ over which was located crane No. 8, three photographs of which were introduced in evidence as appellant’s Exhibits A, B, C. From the floor appellee, as part of his work, operated the crane forward and backward and up and down as might be necessary in doing his work. The crane could be reached only by climbing a brace located near it or by a ladder which must be especially placed for the purpose.
“ (3) There is nothing in the occupation of a molder which would require him to go upon the crane for the purpose of repairing it should it be out of order; a machinist and electrician being employed by appellant to make the necessary repairs. Appellee understood that hé was employed as a molder, and in no other-capacity; that all his duties relative to such employment were ordinarily to be performed on the floor; that he must use the crane to do his work; that, if the crane was out of order and he could not use it or operate it, he should report it to the machinist or electrician, and, if they could not be found, he should sit down or go home.
“(4) Instructions had been given by the superintendent to the foreman to allow no one but the men designated for such work to go upon the crane, and these instructions had been given to the molders by the foreman, but appellee could not speak nor fairly understand either English or the language of his foreman. Appellee had, in fact, gone up to fix or oil the crane several times before the date of his injury.
“(5) A short time before the injury, appellee discovered that the crane was out of order and reported to the machinist, who was also a foreman, that the crane was not working well, because the brake was too loose. Appellee is a German, and the machinist is a Croatian; appellee could not talk with the machinist very well, because they did not speak the same language; yet he could indicate in broken English that ‘the brake is too loose,’ and by showing the machinist say enough in English to inform him what the trouble with the crane was.
“(6) While the machinist was up on the crane look[233]*233ing for the trouble, appellee, not being able to make him fully understand in English, went up the ladder and got off where the machinist was to point out to him where the trouble was.
“ (7) After being on the crane five minutes appellee started to go down the ladder. In some way the machinist or appellee set the machinery in motion, and appellee’s hand was caught in certain gear wheels, and all that part including the four fingers was amputated from a point on the metacarpal bone of the little finger about an inch and three-quarters below the wrist joint diagonally across the hand to a point two and a half inches below the wrist joint, leaving the thumb entirely uninjured.
“(8) It was mutually conceded by the parties that, if appellee is entitled to anything, he is entitled to the maximum compensation of $10 a week.”

If a workman is injured while voluntarily doing something quite outside the scope of the work he is employed to do, it cannot well be said that such injury “arises out of and in the course of his employment.” This is illustrated by the old case of the boy who was engaged to hand balls of clay in molds to a molder, and was told not to touch the machinery; but, having nothing to do for the moment, he did attempt to clean the machinery, and was injured. It was necessarily held that the injury did not “arise out of and in the course of his employment.” Lowe v. Pearson, 1 W. C. C. 5. It was also held that the injury did not arise out of and in the course of the employment where a girl left her work to start an engine when the person whose particular duty it was to do so happened for the moment to be absent. Losh v. Evans & Co., 5 W. C. C. 17.

In other words, the work which one is employed to do, when construed in a reasonably broad and comprehensive way, does limit and mark out “his employment,” within the meaning of the statute. Of course, the scope of such particular employment may be en[234]*234larged for the time being by the directions of some superior who has authority; and in the case of an actual emergency it may be held that any reasonable attempt to preserve the employer’s property is' within the general lines of an employee’s duty. But ordinarily the scope of a workman’s employment is defined by the things he is employed to do, and the things reasonably and fairly incident thereto.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
157 N.W. 34, 190 Mich. 229, 1916 Mich. LEXIS 865, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bischoff-v-american-car-foundry-co-mich-1916.