Favre v. Werk Press Cloth Mfg. Co., Inc.

152 So. 694
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedFebruary 12, 1934
DocketNo. 14548.
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 152 So. 694 (Favre v. Werk Press Cloth Mfg. Co., Inc.) 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
Favre v. Werk Press Cloth Mfg. Co., Inc., 152 So. 694 (La. Ct. App. 1934).

Opinion

HIGGINS, Judge.

This is a suit for one hundred weeks’ compensation at the rate of $6.82 per week and for $250 medical expenses alleged to be due under the workmen’s compensation statute (Act No. 20 of 1914, as amended) for the loss of an eye. The defenses are:

First, that plaintiff’s injury did not arise during the course of his employment;

Second, that the injury did not result while plaintiff was performing services arising out of and incidental to his employment;

Third, that plaintiff was hurt while throwing at another employee with the willful intention of injuring him.

There was judgment dismissing the suit, and the plaintiff has appealed.

The evidence shows that the defendant is admittedly engaged in one of the hazardous businesses enumerated in section 1 of Act No. 20 of 1914, and that the plaintiff was employed as an operator of one of the cloth-making machines on the second floor of the defendant’s plant in the city of New Orleans. Working in close proximity to him were four other young men employed in the same capacity as plaintiff. On Saturday, October 1, 1932, about 4 p. m., the plaintiff went to the toilet, and as he emerged therefrom he came between two other employees, Earl Favre and Johnny Woods, who were playfully throwing at one another a piece of alligator pear seed which had been left over from their noon meal. The plaintiff was struck by a piece of the seed thrown by Earl Favre, his brother, The- plaintiff returned the throw at Earl Favre, and the parties mutually engaged in throwing at each other once more. The plaintiff then retired to where his machine was located for the purpose of cleaning it before leaving the plant. Johnny Woods and Earl Favre continued to throw at each other some distance away from the plaintiff’s machine, and about two minutes later, when Earl Favre threw at Johnny Woods, a piece of the alligator pear seed struck the plaintiff in the left eye. Although the plaintiff suffered pain, he attempted to wipe off the machine, but the pain became too great and he left the premises and went home. It is not disputed that the plaintiff subsequently lost the sight of his left eye.

It appears that the employees ceased their work at 4 p. m., and it was customary to clean their machines before leaving, and that some of the employees, at the time the plaintiff was hurt, were washing their faces and hands and changing their clothes preparatory to retiring from the plant.

Did the accident occur during the course of plaintiff’s employment?

In Kern v. Southport Mill, Ltd., 174 La. 432, 141 So. 19, 21, the Supreme Court said: “Now an accident occurs in the course of an employment when it takes place during the time of such employment; just as a happening occurs in the course of any given day when it takes place during that day. Hence the provision that the accident, to entitle the employee to compensation, must occur in the course of his employment, means nothing more than that it must have taken place during the hours of employment and not at any other time.”

In Baker v. Texas Pipe Line Company, 5 La. App. 25, it was held (syllabus): “Under the Workmen’s Compensation Law of Louisiana an injury sustained by an employee immediately after the close of the day’s work and while he is still on the employer’s premises and in the act of retiring therefrom, arises out of and in the course of his employment.”

In view of the above authorities, we have little difflculty in reaching the conclusion that the injury arose during the course of plaintiff’s employment.

The second contention of the defendant is predicated on the ground that the plaintiff, as an employee, had ceased his work at 4 p. m., and then engaged in “horseplay,” which was wholly disconnected with his employment *696 and in violation of his employer’s instructions and was, therefore, pursuing his own pleasure in participating in throwing the piece of alligator pear seed which was not in any way used in the defendant’s business.

At the outset we may say that mere disobedience to orders by an employee does not defeat his right to compensation. Jones v. Landry, 10 La. App. 740, 122 So. 913.

In the case of Myers v. Louisiana Ry. & Nav. Co., 140 La. 937, 74 So. 256, 257, the Supreme Court held (syllabus): “The test to determine whether injuries to a workman arise out of his employment is not whether the cause of the injury, that is, the agency producing it, was something peculiar to the line of employment, but whether the nature of the employment was such that the risk from which the injury resulted was greater for the workman than for a person not engaged in the employment.”

In Kern v. Southport Mills, Ltd., supra, the Supreme Court stated the rule as follows:

“And, when one finds himself at the scene of accident, not because he voluntarily appeared there but because the necessities of his business called Mm there, the injuries he may suffer by reason of such accident ‘arise out of’ the necessity which brought him there, and hence ‘arise out of’ his employment, if it so be that he was employed and his employment required him to be at the place of the accident at the time when the accident occurred.
“In determining, therefore, whether an accident ‘arose out of’ the employment, it is necessary to consider only this: (1) Was the employee then engaged about his employer’s business and not merely pursuing his own business or pleasure; and (2) did the necessities of that employer’s business reasonably require that the employee be at the place of the accident at the time the accident occurred?
“The question whether or not the employee might have been injured in the same way, and even at the same place and time had he not been called there by the necessities of his employer’s business, but had gone there only for his own pleasure or in pursuit of his own business, has nothing whatever to do with the case. It was his employer’s business which called him to the place and time of the accident and not his own pleasure oí; business; and hence his injuries arose out of his pursuit of his employer’s business and not out of his pursuit of his own business or pleasure.
“In the final analysis that is the sum and substance of the principle on which all compensation cases rest, notwithstanding the many words in which that principle has been wrapped up.”

It is very well established in compensation cases that the danger of injury from horseplay by fellow workmen is a risk incidental to the employment, and claims arising therefrom are compensable, particularly where the injured employee did not originate or participate therein.

In Leonbruno v. Champlain Silk Mills, et al., 229 N. Y. 470, 128 N. E. 711, 13 A. L. R. 522, we find the following:

“Cardozo, J. The claimant while engaged in the performance of his duties in the employer’s factory was struck by an .apple which one of his fellow servants, a boy, was throwing in sport at another, and as a consequence lost the better part of the sight of one eye. * * *
“That it arose ‘in the course of employment’ is unquestioned. That it arose ‘out of’ employment, we now hold.

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Bluebook (online)
152 So. 694, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/favre-v-werk-press-cloth-mfg-co-inc-lactapp-1934.