Plumlee v. Calcasieu Sulphate Paper Co.

132 So. 811, 16 La. App. 670, 1931 La. App. LEXIS 79
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedMarch 3, 1931
DocketNo. 717
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 132 So. 811 (Plumlee v. Calcasieu Sulphate Paper Co.) 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
Plumlee v. Calcasieu Sulphate Paper Co., 132 So. 811, 16 La. App. 670, 1931 La. App. LEXIS 79 (La. Ct. App. 1931).

Opinion

ELLIOTT, J.

Randolph Plumlee, an employee of Calcasieu Sulphate Paper Company, Inc., while performing services for the defendant, arising out of and incidental to his employment, was severely injured. The injury is alleged to have occurred in catching a heavy roll of paper, falling, or about to fall, in defendant’s paper mill on August 17, 1928. Plaintiff alleges a number of injuries and disabilities sustained, all very serious, resulting from said accident. Those in support qf which plaintiff testified are, injury to the nerves, ligaments about the abdomen, injuries to the spinal column and hips, the bones and joints of the spine and hips, hernia in both right and left sides, constant pain and suffering and weakness in the hernial regions, to the extent that he can hardly get about or out of bed; that on or about October 2, 1928; defendant had a physician to perform an operation upon him for the bernia on his right side; that there is constant pain in the area where the operation was performed, etc.

He alleges that he was being paid by defendant at the time of the accident a daily wage of $3 a day, or $18 a week; that said injury received in defendant’s service has produced in him a permanent total disability to do work of any reasonable character. He claims of defendant, compensation at the rate of $11.70 per, week for a" period of 400" weeks; that de7 fendant paid him part of the compensation due him for 18 weeks; and then quit, refusing to make any further payments.

Defendant in the first part of its answer denies that plaintiff was employed by it and injured in its service, but mis uenial is followed by admissions in its answer that it became aware that plaintiff had sustained a hernia as alleged in article 5 of his petition. Defendant further alleges in its answer that on October 2, 1928, it had plaintiff operated on by its physician for hernia on the right side, and had paid plaintiff compensation for 19 5/6 weeks at the rate of $9.75 per week on said account; that plaintiff had entirely recovered from said operation, and prayed that his demand be rejected.

From a judgment rejecting his demand, the plaintiff appealed.

The averments in defendant’s answer amount to an admission that the plaintiff Plumlee was by it employed to work in its paper factory, and while so engaged accidentally sustained a hernia on the right side of his hernial region; that defendant had him operated qn, for said hernia, by its physician, and paid him compensation on said account for 19 5/6 weeks, at the rate of $9.75 per week. Defendant avers that plaintiff has recovered from said operation. All the other averments in plaintiff’s petition are denied.

Defendant’s answering admission restricts the dispute to the question whether plaintiff received, as a result of the accident mentioned, a hernia on the left side of his hernial region, injury to the muscles, nerves, and ligaments of his abdomen, in his spinal column and hips, to the bones and joints of his spine and hips, and suffers pain, discomfort, and weakness in his left hernial region to the extent that he can hardly get about or out of bed, producing in him a permanent total disability to do .work of any reasonable [672]*672character. The amount of compensation, if plaintiff is entitled to anything further than the amount paid him, is also a mat-/ ter of dispute.

Plaintiff alleges that he was being paid at the time of his injury a weekly wage of $18 per week. On the trial he testified that he was receiving 25 cents an hour and working thirteen hours a day. If this was true, and plaintiff worked six days a week, he was in fact being paid more than he claims to have been getting, but we hold that he is bound by the averments in his sworn petition.

Plaintiff, speaking of the time he was in the hospital and in charge of defendant’s physician, says:

“In my right side there was a bump and my left side was hurting me and the doctor told me, if I would be real quiet and lie on my back and elevate my feet, he didn’t think they would have to operate on my left side.
“Q. Who told you that?
“A. Dr. Allums.”

This testimony was given by the plaintiff in open court on the trial of the case September 23, 1929. Dr. Allums’ testimony had been taken in Shreveport on September 19, 1929, and was offered in evidence by the plaintiff in opening the trial. Dr. Allums testified that Dr. Mangum was in charge of the hospital in which the (plaintiff was operated on, and that he (Allums) had been plaintiff’s regular family physician, and had known plaintiff for 3 or 4 years; that he operated on plaintiff for hernia, he was not absolutely sure that it was on the right side, but thought it was on the right side; that plaintiff had no other physical trouble that he knew of, except some shin ulcers; that plaintiff did not complain of any other physical disability or injuries at the time, and he did not treat him for any other.

“Q. Did you know of his ever having any other physical disability besides this hernia?
“A. I don’t recall any.
“Q. Did he ever complain to you of the back injury or of the nerves?
“A. He did not.”

Dr. Allums’ testimony having been taken before the trial, this testimony of the plaintiff as to his condition in the hospital while under defendant’s phsyician’s care, “In my right side there was a bump and my left side was hurting me and the doctor told me, if I would be real quiet and lie on my back and elevate my feet that he did not think they would have to operate on my left side,” given by the plaintiff while putting, his case before the court in chief, called for contradiction on the part of the defendant, if untrue. Because, if the statement was true, then defendant’s physician, Dr. Allums, was well aware that there was trouble in plaintiff’s left hernial region at the time he was in the hospital, regarded it as an injury sustained in the same way that the hernia for which he was operated on was produced, discussed the matter with the plaintiff, and advised him as to the course to (pursue in an effort to avert,, an operation on account of same. Dr. Allums' testimony, which had been offered in evidence by the plaintiff at the time he made this statement, cannot be regarded as a denial of the truth of plaintiff’s quoted statement, because Dr. Allums did not testify with reference to such a matter. Plaintiff made the statement at a time, when, if untrue, defendant could have called on the court for time in which to take the testimony of Dr. Allums for the purpose of showing that it was, but no such request or effort was made to show by Dr. Allums that the conversation did not take place. Plaintiff’s testimony on the subject is supported by the testimony of Dr. Cassidy, taken at [673]*673Shreveport at the same time that of Dr. Allums was taken and introduced in evidence at the commencement of the trial. Dr. Cassidy, on the staff of the Charity Hospital at Shreveport, examined plaintiff on February 27, 1929, some .6 or 7 months previous to the trial of the case.

The testimony of Dr. Cassidy is not so much in the form of an opinion as it is the ¡positive assertion of physical facts found.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
132 So. 811, 16 La. App. 670, 1931 La. App. LEXIS 79, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/plumlee-v-calcasieu-sulphate-paper-co-lactapp-1931.