Chicago, I.&L. Ry. Co. v. Clendennin

• Decision Date: 03 April 1924
• Docket Number: No. 11885.,11885.
• Citation: 143 N.E. 303,81 Ind.App. 323
• Court: Indiana Appellate Court
• Parties: CHICAGO, I. & L. RY. CO. v. CLENDENNIN.

81 Ind.App. 323

143 N.E. 303

CHICAGO, I. & L. RY. CO.

v.CLENDENNIN.

No. 11885.

Appellate Court of Indiana, Division No. 1.

April 3, 1924.

Appeal from Industrial Board.

Proceedings under the Workmen's Compensation Act between Elza L. Clendennin, employé, and the Chicago, Indianapolis & Louisville Railway Company, employer. From an award of compensation, the employer appeals. Affirmed.

C. C. Hine and Alfred Evens, both of Chicago, Ill., for appellant.

Miller & Blair and Thos. J. Sare, all of Bloomington, for appellee.

REMY, C. J.

Appellee was employed by appellant as car inspector, and while in the performance of his duty in the inspection of a car at the Hoadley Stone Mill an employé of the mill, in a spirit of sport, and to scare appellee, threw a stone upon the car. The stone rolled off and struck and injured appellee. The throwing of the stone was without warning to the appellee, and no such act of sport had previously been indulged in by any employé of the stone mill or by appellee.

From an award of compensation to appellee, this appeal is prosecuted.

The one question presented is whether, under the facts above stated, and which were found by the Industrial Board, the accident which resulted in appellee's injury arose out of his employment, within the meaning of section 2 of the Indiana Workmen's Compensation Act (Acts 1915, p. 392 [section 8020m, Burns' Supp. 1921]). It is urged by appellant that appellee's injuries were occasioned by a sportive act of an employé of the stone mill which was in no way connected with any duty of appellee's employment, and therefore did not arise out of the employment. In support of its contention appellant cites In re Loper, 64 Ind. App. 571, 116 N. E. 324. It will be observed that the question presented in the case at bar was not involved in the case of In re Loper. Whatever the dictum of the opinion in that case may be, the only question actually decided was that, where an employer, with knowledge of the facts, permits certain sportive acts to continue among his employés, the sportive acts become an element of the conditions under which the employé is required to work, rendering the employer liable for compensation.

[1][2][3] An accident is said to arise out of the employment when there is a causal connection between it and the performance of some service of the employment; and this court has held that a causal relation is established when the accident is shown to have arisen out of a risk which a reasonable person might have comprehended as incidental to the employment at the time of entering into it, or when the evidence shows an incidental connection between the conditions under which the employé works and his resulting injury. Empire Health, etc., Ins. Co. v. Purcell (1921) 76 Ind. App. 551, 132 N. E. 664. While there must be some causal relation between the employment and the injury, it is not necessary that the injury should have been foreseen or expected. A causal relation is established, if after the event it appears to have had its origin in a risk connected with the employment, and to have flowed from that source as a rational consequence. Mueller v. Klingman (1919) 73 Ind. App. 136, 125 N. E. 464. Although the accident may not be connected with, or have any relation to, the particular act of the injured man at the time he received the injury, nevertheless, if in point of fact the position in which the man was doing the work and the place he was necessarily required to occupy under his employment obligation were a position and place of danger which caused the accident, it may fairly be said that the accident arose out of his employment. Thom v. Sinclair [1917] A. C. 127.

[4][5] Appellee's obligation to his...