Perkins's Case

180 N.E. 142, 278 Mass. 294, 1932 Mass. LEXIS 823
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedFebruary 29, 1932
StatusPublished
Cited by38 cases

This text of 180 N.E. 142 (Perkins's Case) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Perkins's Case, 180 N.E. 142, 278 Mass. 294, 1932 Mass. LEXIS 823 (Mass. 1932).

Opinion

Rugg, C.J.

This is an appeal from a decree entered in the Superior Court. The facts material to the grounds of this judgment are these: The employee received on December 18, 1928, an injury arising out of and in the course of his employment by a subscriber. He entered into an agreement in writing with the insurer which was duly approved by the Industrial Accident Board, wherein it was stated that his average weekly wage was $42 and the compensation due per week $18. He was paid that compensation weekly up to November 15, 1929, when it was reduced to $4.67 per week based on his earnings. He desired to secure a greater partial rate of compensation and alleged that his average weekly wages for a year previous to his injury were in excess of $42. He actually returned to work on September 12, 1929, and the insurer contended that there had been an overpayment. The issues tried before the board member in April, 1930, were (1) whether as matter of law the employee was precluded from showing that the agreement for compensation was incorrect and (2) what his actual earnings were after his return to work. The finding on the latter point is not disputed and was that his ■ average weekly wages subsequent to September [296]*29612, 1929, were $46.48. The controversy relates to the first issue. The witnesses before the board member were the employee and the bookkeeper of the employer. The employee testified that while he was in the hospital a representative of the insurer asked him some questions and wrote the answers on paper and asked him to sign them in the presence of his wife and a doctor. What that paper was does not clearly appear but seemingly it was a statement descriptive of the way in which the accident happened. He testified further that he received a letter dated January 4, 1929, from the insurer, of this tenor: “We enclose herewith check covering compensation due to date. Please sign the enclosed agreement, have your signature witnessed and return to us at once.” That was the agreement for compensation. No representative of the insurer was present when the employee signed it. A neighbor of the employee witnessed his signature to that agreement. That agreement was sent to the employee through the mail and was returned by him to the insurer in the same way, and then he received compensation weekly.

The employee testified that some representative of the insurer prepared the agreement and that the statement therein contained, to the effect that his weekly wages were $42, was correct; that he received in addition a commission which was drawn when he made sales; and that he did not know why his commission account did not appear on the agreement. The bookkeeper of the employer testified from the record of wages and commissions paid to the employee in the period from January 1 to December 22, 1928, nine days less than a year, that the employee’s earnings amounted to $3,351.74; that his signature was attached to the accident report sent to the Industrial Accident Board; and that he was unable to say whether at any time prior to December, 1929, he advised the insurer that the employee earned more than $42 a week.

The decision of the board member was that the report of the accident stated that the wages of the employee were $42 a week; that in a statement dated December 27, 1928, signed by the employee, appeared the following, “My [297]*297weekly wage is forty-two dollars”; that in the agreement in regard to compensation signed by the employee in January, 1929, there was the same statement in respect to the weekly wage; and that notwithstanding these statements the employee in fact was paid an average weekly wage of $64.46. The board member states the question to be “whether the employee by signing an agreement in regard to compensation stating clearly that his average weekly wages were $42 and by his other acts and statements in the period not far from the date of the injury is precluded at this time from establishing a different average weekly wage.” As bearing on this point the finding is: “No question of good faith or honesty upon the part of any of the parties arises. In making whatever statements were made the parties in declaring that $42 was the average weekly wage undoubtedly spoke in a colloquial way, — simply not considering the amounts which the employee received as commission. Upon all the evidence I find . . . that by the terms of the agreement for compensation which was approved by the Department of Industrial Accidents his average weekly wages previous to the injury were established at $42 weekly; . . . that the sum of $42 weekly was inserted in the agreement for compensation last referred to by mutual mistake of the parties thereto, and that the actual average weekly wages of the employee for the year previous to his injury, within the meaning of the Act and as construed by law, were $64.46.” He thereupon ruled as matter of law that it was not within the jurisdiction of the board to correct an error made in an agreement for compensation, and that such correction must be made in the Superior Court. The conclusion of his decision is as follows: “Under the findings and rulings as made above I am obliged to find further that the employee since September 12, 1929, has been receiving average weekly wages greater in amount than it has been decided he received at the time of the injury. I therefore find that no further compensation is at this time due the employee; but expressly reserve his rights for a correction of the amount of compensation due from and after September 12, 1929.” The reviewing board affirmed and adopted the findings of [298]*298fact of the board member, reversed his ruling of law, and ruled that “Where mutual mistake of fact has been shown as to that part of the agreement in regard to compensation which states the employee’s average weekly wages to be $42, it is within the jurisdiction of the Board to revise the agreement in that respect and to find, in accordance with the evidence, that the employee’s average weekly wages before his injury were $64.46. The Reviewing Board do so find.” In the Superior Court the trial judge found: “Upon the facts found and reported by the Industrial Accident Board I am unable to reach the conclusion that the statement of the employee’s average weekly wage as $42 in the agreement in regard to compensation entered into by him with the insurer was due to a mutual mistake of fact and find that there was no mutual mistake of fact in respect of the figure so adopted, and that the mistake, if there was a mistake, was solely on the part of the employee.” A decree was therefore entered reciting, in substance, this finding, and declaring that since there was no mutual mistake of fact by the parties to the agreement for compensation the parties were bound by the average weekly wage stated therein, and further declaring “That the employee was bound by the average weekly wage of $42 stated in the agreement for compensation approved by the board and having returned to work September 12, 1929, and having earned an average weekly wage of $46.48 since that date no subsequent payments should have been made and the employee is hereby ordered to refund to the insurer the full amount of the compensation paid between September 12, 1929, and November 15, 1929, at the rate of $18 per week or $164.57.”

The procedure thus outlined was taken without objection by either the employee or the insurer. So far as such procedure was taken before the board member or the Industrial Accident Board, it was irregular. It is provided by G. L. c.

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Bluebook (online)
180 N.E. 142, 278 Mass. 294, 1932 Mass. LEXIS 823, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/perkinss-case-mass-1932.