Reed v. Steamship Yaka

• Decision Date: 27 April 1962
• Docket Number: 600,601.,No. 13,13
• Citation: 307 F.2d 203
• Parties: Elijah REED, Appellee, v. STEAMSHIP YAKA, Her Engines, Boilers, Machinery, etc. (Waterman Steamship Corporation, Owner and Claimant), Appellant in No. 13,600, and Pan-Atlantic Steamship Corporation, Appellant in No. 13,601.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

307 F.2d 203 (1962)

Elijah REED, Appellee, v. STEAMSHIP YAKA, Her Engines, Boilers, Machinery, etc. (Waterman Steamship Corporation, Owner and Claimant), Appellant in No. 13,600, and Pan-Atlantic Steamship Corporation, Appellant in No. 13,601.

Nos. 13,600, 13,601.

United States Court of Appeals Third Circuit.

Argued December 18, 1961.

Filed April 27, 1962.

Rehearing Denied July 16, 1962.

As Amended July 26, 1962.

Harrison G. Kildare, Philadelphia, Pa. (Rawle & Henderson, Philadelphia, Pa., Thomas F. Mount, Philadelphia, Pa., of counsel, on the brief), for appellant in 13,600.

T. E. Byrne, Jr., Philadelphia, Pa. (Krusen, Evans & Byrne, Philadelphia, Pa., on the brief), for appellant in 13,601.

Joseph Boardman, Philadelphia, Pa. (Freedman, Landy & Lorry, Philadelphia, Pa., on the brief), for appellee.

Before McLAUGHLIN, KALODNER and HASTIE, Circuit Judges.

HASTIE, Circuit Judge.

Libellant Reed, the appellee here, is a longshoreman who was injured while employed by appellant Pan-Atlantic Steamship Corporation and engaged in loading the steamship Yaka. The accident occurred in the hold of the ship when a wooden pallet upon which Reed was standing broke. The pallet was part of staging which the longshoremen themselves had brought on board the ship and had erected.

The libel was solely in rem against the Yaka. The ship was and is owned by Waterman Steamship Corporation, which, as owner and claimant, has defended this libel. However, at the time of the accident in suit the ship had been demised to and was being operated by Pan-Atlantic Steamship Corporation as a bareboat charterer. This libel was instituted after the expiration of the demise and the return of the ship to its owner.

The libel was filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania at a time when the Yaka was not within that jurisdiction. However, Waterman answered the libel on its merits averring that it "voluntarily appeared as claimant to avoid attachment and delay of the vessel if it should subsequently be present" within the jurisdiction. Waterman also impleaded Pan-Atlantic as the demisee of the ship at the time of the accident, alleging that Pan-Atlantic was obligated to indemnify the ship and its owner for any loss they might suffer as a result of the principal claim.

A trial on the question of liability resulted in a permissible finding that libellant's injury had been caused by an unseaworthy condition created by Pan-Atlantic's employees during the demise. 1960, 183 F.Supp. 69. The court then concluded as a matter of law that, although the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Act prevented Pan-Atlantic from being liable to its employee Reed for breach of warranty of seaworthiness, the ship was nevertheless accountable in rem for the injuries caused by its unseaworthiness. At the same time, liability over was imposed upon Pan-Atlantic. Both Waterman, on behalf of the Yaka, and Pan-Atlantic have appealed.

On this appeal, it is argued for the first time that jurisdiction in rem never attached in this case because the ship was never arrested and no bond or stipulation for value was ever filed.¹ The second and more fundamental contention of both appellants is that the accident did not and could not subject the ship to any liability in rem because it did not create any personal liability against anyone having an interest in the ship.

The first point requires only brief analysis. While the power of an admiralty court to exercise authority over a ship normally depends upon the arrest of the ship within the court's territorial jurisdiction, a claimant can waive this requirement and consent to jurisdiction so far as its interest in the vessel is concerned. The Willamette, 9th Cir. 1895, 70 F. 874. See generally 2 Benedict, Admiralty, Knauth ed. 1940, § 242. A recent decision of the Supreme Court, Continental Grain Co. v. Barge FBL-585, 1960, 364 U.S. 19, 80 S.Ct. 1470, 4 L.Ed. 2d 1540, is instructive. In that case a ship was beyond the jurisdiction of the court when a proceeding in rem was filed against it. However, the owner, as claimant, gave the libellant a "letter undertaking" stipulating that the rights of the parties would "`for all purposes be * * * precisely the same as they would have been had the vessel, in fact, been taken into custody by the United States Marshal under said in rem process, and released by the filing of claim and release bond * * *.'" Id. at 29, 80 S.Ct. at 1476, 4 L.Ed.2d at 1547. The Supreme Court treated this submission as perfecting the jurisdiction of the court. We think the voluntary appearance of the claimant to respond to the libel on its merits in this case was an equivalent and equally effective undertaking that its interest in the ship should be subject to the authority of the court. Cf. United States v. Ames, 1879, 99 U.S. 35, 25 L.Ed. 295; J. K. Welding Co. v. Gotham Marine Corp., S.D.N.Y.1931, 47 F.2d 332.

We come now to the basic contention that the imposition of liability on the ship was improper because the accident in suit gave rise to no personal liability.

A similar question was carefully considered and decided by this court in Smith v. The Mormacdale, 1952, 198 F.2d 849, cert. denied, 1953, 345 U.S. 908, 73 S.Ct. 648, 97 L.Ed. 1344. There the owner and operator of a ship employed a stevedore who was injured as a result of the unseaworthiness of the vessel. Since the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Act, in establishing a workmen's compensation scheme, deprived an injured employee of all other rights against his employer, the injured longshoreman took no action against the shipowner but libeled the ship, claiming that it was directly and independently liable in rem for the consequences of its unseaworthiness. However, this court described such a proceeding against the ship itself as merely a procedural device of admiralty for more readily effectuating the liability of some jural person who has breached some personal obligation, in that case the absolute duty that the law imposes upon a shipowner to maintain a seaworthy vessel. We looked through the fiction of "the so-called independent personality of the ship" and recognized that "an action against the vessel is realistically an action against" the owner, 198 F.2d at 850. Analytically, there had to be a pre-existing maritime lien upon which to base the remedy of recovery from or through the ship, and since the owner-employer was not liable to its injured employee, there was no underlying obligation that could have given rise to such a lien. Accord, Samuels v. Munson S. S. Line, 5th Cir. 1933, 63 F.2d 861; cf. Continental Grain Co. v. Barge FBL-585, supra. See generally Gilmore & Black, Admiralty, 1957, 483-510.

The case at hand is different only in that the suing longshoreman's employer was a bareboat charterer rather than an owner. But for present purposes that is not a significant distinction. In admiralty such a demisee acquires full control and authority over the ship and the rights and duties which attend such dominion. He takes the owner's place for the term of the demise. United States v. Shea, 1894, 152 U.S. 178, 14 S.Ct. 519, 38 L.Ed. 403; Leary v. United States, 1871, 81 U.S. (14 Wall.) 607, 610, 20 L.Ed. 756 (dictum); Gilmore & Black, op. cit. supra at 215-16. Thus, the doctrine of Smith v. The Mormacdale is applicable to this case and prevents the present libellant from recovering against the Yaka unless someone other than his employer breached a duty to provide longshoremen with a seaworthy ship.

The only other person who was even arguably so obligated is Waterman. Unquestionably, as owner, Waterman warranted the seaworthiness of...