Perkins v. Willamette Industries, Inc.

542 P.2d 473, 273 Or. 566, 1975 Ore. LEXIS 356
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 20, 1975
StatusPublished
Cited by32 cases

This text of 542 P.2d 473 (Perkins v. Willamette Industries, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Perkins v. Willamette Industries, Inc., 542 P.2d 473, 273 Or. 566, 1975 Ore. LEXIS 356 (Or. 1975).

Opinions

HOWELL, J.

Plaintiff filed this action to recover damages for personal injuries which he incurred on premises of the defendant in Dallas, Oregon. Defendant filed a supplemental answer alleging that defendant and plaintiff’s employer shared joint supervision and control of the premises and that, therefore, under ORS 656.154 plaintiff was restricted to the benefits of the Workmen’s Compensation Act. The trial court found for defendant, and plaintiff appeals.

Both the defendant and plaintiff’s employer are subject to the Workmen’s Compensation Act. At the time of the accident, the defendant operated a lumber and plywood operation which produced wood shavings as a by-product. The shavings were blown into large bins in which they were stored pending removal. When a bin became full, defendant would notify plaintiff’s employer, Timber By-Products, Inc., and a truck would be dispatched by Timber By-Products to haul the shavings to a processing plant in Albany. In order to empty the bins and collect the shavings, the truck drivers for Timber By-Products would park under the bin doors, pull a pin attached to a handle and swing the handle open, thus allowing the doors, to open and dumping the shavings into the truck. After the shavings had fallen, the doors would partially close automatically and would be shut by [569]*569the truck driver using the handle, or a winch, and a counterweight. The driver would use a T-shaped bar to hold the doors closed while he reinserted the pin that locked the doors.

Normally, three to four trips daily were made to defendant’s plant by Timber By-Products truck drivers to empty the bins and haul away the shavings. Other than directing the drivers, to the particular bin to be emptied, none of defendant’s employees were specifically authorized or directed to assist the truck drivers in loading the shavings. Occasionally, however, some of defendant’s employees voluntarily assisted the truck drivers in closing the bin doors. Defendant was solely responsible for the maintenance and repair of the bins.

At the time of the accident, plaintiff was a truck driver for Timber By-Products and was collecting the shavings from one of the bins at defendant’s plant. Plaintiff was injured when the door closing mechanism malfunctioned while plaintiff and one of defendant’s employees were attempting to close the bin door.

At the time this ease was before the trial court, ORS 656.154 provided as follows:

“(1) If the injury to a workman is due to the negligence or wrong of a third person not in the same employ, the injured workman, or if death results from the injury, his widow, children or other dependents, as the case may be, may elect to seek a remedy against such third person. However, no action shall be brought against any such third person if he or his workman causing the injury was, at the time of the injury, on premises over which he had joint supervision and control with the employer of the injured workman and was an employer subject to ORS 656.001 to 656.794.
[570]*570“(2) As used in this section, ‘premises’ means the place where the employer, or his workman causing the injury, and the employer of the injured workman, are engaged in the furtherance of a common enterprise or the accomplishment of the same or related purposes in operation.
“(3) No person engaged in pickup or delivery of any goods, wares or merchandise to or from the premises of any employer other than his own shall he deemed to have joint supervision or control over the premises of a third party employer.” (Emphasis added.)

The trial court concluded that, under this court’s interpretation of the statute, the plaintiff and defendant “were engaged in the performance of component parts of an undertaking on the defendant’s premises, and under their joint supervision and control.” The court also determined that plaintiff did not come under the “pickup or delivery” exception contained in subsection (3) of the statute.

However, after the trial court’s decision and while this case was pending on appeal, the legislature amended OES 656.154 so as to repeal the restrictions on third party actions in joint supervision and control cases. Thus, Chapter 152, Oregon Laws 1975, which became effective July 1, 1975, deleted all italicized language in the statute above. Plaintiff now urges us to apply that amendment retroactively so as to remove any question of joint supervision and control from this case.

Essentially, determining whether a particular statute was meant to apply prospectively or retrospectively is a matter of ascertaining the intent of the legislature. In the absence of an explicit indication of that intent, it is our duty to determine the legislature’s probable intent. Although it is sometimes said [571]*571that remedial

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Bluebook (online)
542 P.2d 473, 273 Or. 566, 1975 Ore. LEXIS 356, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/perkins-v-willamette-industries-inc-or-1975.