Great Western Power Co. v. Industrial Accident Commission

218 P. 1009, 191 Cal. 724, 1923 Cal. LEXIS 500
California Supreme Court·Decided September 7, 1923·No. S. F. No. 10490.·Published·Cited by 21 cases

Opinion

WASTE, J.

This is a proceeding in certiorari to review an award .of the respondent Industrial Accident Commission upon the ground that the Commission rendered an unlawful award and one in excess of its authority. Lorin L. Savercool, while employed as a mill-hand by the petitioner, Great Western Power Company, the employer and employee being then subject to the provisions of the Workmen’s Compensation, Insurance and Safety Act (Stats. 1917, p. 831), sustained an injury occurring in the course of and arising out of his employment. His right hand and arm were caught in the moving machinery of an edger, resulting in lacerations and other injuries which proximately caused his death.

At the time of his decease the injured employee was only twenty years old. For many years he and his father had jointly supported the father’s family, consisting, besides himself, of the father, mother, and nine children. In addition to these members of the family, the employee’s grandfather, aged seventy-three years, resided with them part of the time. On application filed with the Industrial Accident Commission for a death benefit on account of the injury, the Commission found that the entire family, other than the grandfather and one sister, were partially dependent on the injured employee for support. His annual contribution for that purpose, it found, amounted to $1,366.66. On that sum, as a basis of computation, it made -an award in the sum of $4,099.98, which it directed to be paid to James Savercool “in his own right to be used for the support of all the dependents.” This award petitioner seeks to have *727 annulled. The situation thus presented is one of partial dependency, in which case the dependents are entitled to recover the reasonable expense of the deceased employee’s burial, not to exceed $100, and, in addition thereto, a death benefit which shall be equivalent to three times the annual amount devoted by the deceased to the support of the person or persons so partially dependent. (Workmen’s Compensation Act, see. 9 (c) [2].) Petitioner’s contention is that the respondent exceeded its jurisdiction in making the award here under review, in that it made an allowance greatly in excess of the statutory limitation. It does not question the right of the respondent to award some compensation to the dependents of the deceased employee, but raises an issue as to the lawfulness of the award made.

The respondent’s first line of defense (to the attack of the petitioner is that there is evidence to support the findings of fact it made on the hearing, and, therefore, its action cannot be reviewed in this proceeding. It relies, of course, upon the provision of the statute which declares that the findings and conclusions of the Commission on questions of fact shall be conclusive and final, and shall not be subject to review. (Workmen’s Compensation Act, sec. 67 (c).) Its position, in effect, is that the power of this court to annul and set aside an award of the Commission is confined to those cases wherein the Commission has made a finding as to some jurisdictional fact which is not supported by the evidence, and that it does not go to a case where, upon the facts found, the Commission has authority to make ° an award, but has made one contrary to what the law calls for upon those facts. In passing upon the same contention in an earlier case the court said: " Section 67 (a) of the Workmen’s Compensation Act says that any party affected by a final order of the commission ‘may appeal to the supreme court of this state . . . for a writ of certiorari . . . for the purpose of having the lawfulness of the original order . . . inquired into and determined. ’ It is the lawfulness of the award in question that is now under consideration. Upon the facts found the statute prescribed the amount to be allowed as a death benefit, and the commission in allowing a different amount rendered an unlawful award and one in excess of *728 its authority. ’ ’ (Spreckels Sugar Co. v. Industrial Acc. Com., 186 Cal. 256, 260 [199 Pac. 8, 10].)

The petitioner also contends- that the award is unreasonable as being greater in amount than is legally allowable in this case. Such contention goes beyond the question of reasonableness of the amount allowed as compensation, and is, in effect, a restatement of the claim that the award was unlawful. Therefore, whether or not respondent is correct in its position, that the alleged unreasonableness of the award is not a ground of review by this court, does not require further consideration in this -connection.

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Great Western Power Co. v. Industrial Accident Commission, 218 P. 1009, 191 Cal. 724, 1923 Cal. LEXIS 500 (Cal. 1923).

218 P. 1009 (Great Western Power Co. v. Industrial Accident Commission) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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