Jones v. Traders & General Ins. Co.

• Citation: 169 S.W.2d 160
• Decision Date: 17 February 1943
• Docket Number: No. 1927-7992.,1927-7992.
• Parties: JONES et al. v. TRADERS & GENERAL INS. CO.
• Court: Supreme Court of Texas

169 S.W.2d 160

JONES et al. v. TRADERS & GENERAL INS. CO.

No. 1927-7992.

Commission of Appeals of Texas, Section B.

February 17, 1943.

Rehearing Denied March 31, 1943.

Error to Court of Civil Appeals of Second Supreme Judicial District.

Suit under the Workmen's Compensation Act by Lucille Jones and her child to set aside an award of the Industrial Accident Board in favor of the Traders & General Insurance Company, insurance carrier. Judgment for petitioners was reversed by the Court of Civil Appeals, 160 S.W.2d 569, which rendered judgment in favor of the insurance carrier, and petitioners bring error.

Judgment of Court of Civil Appeals affirmed and judgment of District Court reversed.

Clark, Craik, Burns & Weddell, and Chester Clark, all of Fort Worth, and Lindsley M. Brown, of Arlington, for plaintiffs in error.

Lightfoot, Robertson & Gano, of Fort Worth, for defendant in error.

SMEDLEY, Commissioner.

Tom P. Jones, an employee of a construction company insured by respondent, Traders & General Insurance Company, under the Workmen's Compensation Law (Vernon's Ann.Civ.St. art. 8309, § 2), stepped on a nail which penetrated the ball of his foot, on May 4, 1938. The wound having become infected, it was necessary for Jones to have it treated, opened and drained a number of times during a period of several weeks. He suffered intense pain and on November 11, 1938, drank a mixture of concentrated lye, cleaning fluid and insect poison, which caused his death three days later. The suit is by petitioners, Lucille Jones, his widow, and Tom P. Jones, Jr., his minor son, as his legal beneficiaries, for the recovery of compensation under the provisions of the statute.

On the first trial the district court sustained a general demurrer to the petition and dismissed the suit, but that judgment was reversed by the Court of Civil Appeals and the cause remanded for trial. 144 S.W.2d 689. On the second trial, following a verdict favorable to petitioners, judgment was rendered in their favor against respondent for $6,019.54. The Court of Civil Appeals reversed that judgment and rendered judgment that petitioners take nothing by their suit, holding that the trial court should have instructed a verdict for respondent. 160 S.W.2d 569.

The theory of the case as presented by petitioners is that the employee took his life while in a delirium or frenzy, the result of constant and intense pain from his injury. The jury found in answer to special issues that the injury suffered by Tom P. Jones in the course of his employment was the producing cause of his death; that the injury caused Jones to become mentally unbalanced to the extent that he did not understand the consequences of his act in taking his own life; that such mental condition was the producing cause of his death; and that the taking of poison by Jones was not caused by his willful intention and attempt to injure himself.

The question for decision is whether there is any evidence of probative value to sustain the foregoing findings of the jury, all of which relate to the question of causal connection between the injury and the death.

The Court of Civil Appeals in both of its opinions adopted as applicable and controlling the following rule from 71 Corpus Juris, p. 638: "Provided the insanity results from a compensable accident and not from a brooding over the injury or other causes, the suicide of an employee while insane may entitle his dependents to compensation therefor; thus, where there follows as a direct result of the accident an insanity of such violence as to cause the victim to take his own life through an uncontrollable impulse or in a delirium of frenzy without conscious volition to produce death, there is a direct and unbroken causal connection between the physical injury and the death; however, where the suicide is the result of voluntary and willful choice determined by a moderately intelligent mental power with knowledge of the purpose and effect of the act, even though dominated by a disordered mind, a new and independent agency breaks the chain of causation."

An annotation in 56 A.L.R. 459, 460 thus states substantially the same rule: "Accordingly, when an accident under compensable circumstances ends in self-destruction, which is the result of uncontrollable impulse, or a delirium of frenzy, and without conscious volition to produce death, with knowledge of the physical consequences of the suicidal act, it has been held, even in the American cases, that there is a direct and unbroken causal connection between the accident and the death, and compensation therefore is to be awarded."

The texts quoted are well supported by the authorities cited and by the following later decisions: McFarland v. Department of Labor & Industries, 188 Wash. 357, 62 P.2d 714; Kazazian v. Segan, 182 A. 351, 14 N.J.Misc. 78; Ruschetti's Case, 299 Mass. 426, 13 N.E.2d 34.

Compensation is awarded to the legal beneficiary of the deceased employee if death results from the injury. Article 8306, Section 8, Revised Civil Statutes of 1925. Causal connection must be established between the injury and the death. The injury must be the producing cause of the death, and producing cause has been defined as "that cause which, in a natural and continuous sequence, produces the death * * * in issue, and without which the death * * * would not have occurred." Texas Employers' Ins. Ass'n v. Burnett, 129 Tex. 407, 410, 105 S.W.2d 200, 201; Texas Indemnity Ins. Co. v. Staggs, 134 Tex. 318, 134 S.W.2d 1026. In the Burnett case it was held that the injury was not the producing cause of the death, because the employee died as the result of typhoid fever which was in no way produced or caused by the injury, there being thus an independent intervening agency to which the death was directly due.

The quotation above made from Corpus Juris is the application to a case of death by suicide of the rule that controlled the decision of the Burnett case. Suicide is an independent agency that breaks the causal connection between the injury and the death if the mental condition of the victim, though disordered, is such that the suicide is the result of voluntary and willful choice; but if the insanity is so violent as to cause him to take his life through uncontrollable impulse or in a delirium or frenzy, there is a direct and unbroken connection between the injury and the death.

There is evidence which at least tends to prove that the mental condition of Jones at the time when he took his life was the result of long suffering from the injured foot. The important inquiry is as to the extent of his derangement, or as to his mental power, at the time he killed himself. Is there evidence of frenzy or of uncontrollable impulse? The evidence most directly relevant to this inquiry is the testimony of petitioner, Mrs. Jones, together with that of Dr. Collins, who was called as a witness by petitioners.

The substance of the testimony of Mrs. Jones in so far as it relates to her husband's suffering and mental condition follows. When he came home his foot had a two inch gash in it, was swollen and very red. He did not go to work after that. He remained at home and in bed most of the time. He went to a doctor who operated or cut on his foot five different times. He visited the doctor's office many times and was able to "get about" on crutches but could not wear a shoe on the injured foot. Before his injury he was in perfect health and in good spirits. After the injury he was highly nervous and was never able to sleep without taking medicine. He was restless, would not talk to his friends and took no interest in his family. He expressed the belief that his foot would never get well. He lost about twenty pounds in weight. His appetite failed and during his last few days he lived on tomato juice and sweet milk. He never complained of pain except in his foot. His doctors gave him a number of prescriptions to relieve the pain from which he suffered night and day and he continued to take the opiates up to the time of his death.

On the night before November 11, the day on which her husband drank the poison, he did not sleep at all. She could not keep him in the house. "He was on his crutches and could barely touch his foot to the floor and just cry". The next morning she was making soap in the washhouse, using lye, of which she had three cans, when her husband came to her and told her not to use one of the cans of lye. He further said: "I want you to come in the house, I don't want you out there any more". At that time she did not know what he had in his mind. Thereafter he left home and went to his nephew's house. He returned at about 11 o'clock, after she had finished making the soap. She then made a brief visit to a neighbor's house and on her return a short time after noon, he told her and urged her to go and give water to the chickens. She went to water the chickens and when she returned she found him lying on the bed. The only thing he said before he was taken to the hospital was: "Honey, I'm gone." She asked him: "What on earth have you done?" He said nothing in reply, but pulled a small notebook from his pocket and handed it to her. On the first page, in his handwriting, were these words: "Look in this book for note my foot hurts me so bad (Signed) Tom". On another page in the middle of the book, also written by him, was the following: "Look on jug at gate on left from here for red cleaning fluid in can lye in baking powder can, 3 mixed." She found at the place to which the note directed her a lye can, one-half of which was gone, and a baking powder can containing a mixture of lye, cleaning fluid and London purple. Her husband was taken to the hospital immediately and died there three days later. While he was in...