Anderson v. Security Bldg. Co.

• Citation: 100 Conn. 373,123 A. 843
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Decision Date: 01 March 1924
• Parties: ANDERSON v. SECURITY BLDG. CO. ET AL.

123 A. 843

100 Conn. 373

ANDERSON v. SECURITY BLDG. CO. ET AL.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

March 1, 1924

Appeal from Superior Court, Fairfield County; Frank D. Haines Judge.

Proceedings under the Workmen's Compensation Act (Pub. Acts 1913, c 138, as amended) by William Anderson, claimant, opposed by the Security Building Company, employer, and the AEtna Life Insurance Company of Hartford, insurer. From judgment of the superior court sustaining an award of the compensation commissioner, the employer and insurer appeal. No error.

William H. Comley, of Bridgeport, for appellants.

Carl Foster and Thomas C. Coughlin, both of Bridgeport, for appellee.

CURTIS, J.

The defendants in their appeal allege errors on the part of the superior court in failing to grant certain motions to correct the finding of the commissioner. They also allege that the court erred in holding that under the subordinate facts the injuries complained of by the plaintiff " arose out of his employment."

As to the matter of correcting the finding we deem it unnecessary to consider the reasons of appeal relating thereto, because if the corrections were made as requested they would not affect the award.

There was no controversy that the plaintiff was in the employ of the defendant on October 31, 1921, and had been for several months, and on that date while at work received an injury. He was injured by being shot by a fellow employee. The claimant and a fellow employee, named Markus, were employed to do janitor work in an office building in the nighttime. The commissioner found that, after 1 o'clock at night--

" The claimant unlocked a door entering into one of the offices to go in and get a waste basket, and when he came out Markus was standing in the door with two revolvers in his hands. He commenced firing, and shot claimant twice, and then started back to the sixth floor. The claimant fell to the floor, and was trying to get to the elevator when Markus again came down from the sixth floor, stood over the claimant, and fired at him until the revolvers snapped because they contained no more bullets. The claimant was then able to get down to the second floor, where he awakened one of the day janitors, who called an ambulance, and he was taken to St. Vincent's Hospital. Subsequently Markus was arrested, adjudged insane, and committed to the Connecticut Hospital for Insane at Middletown."

The commissioner also found that Markus was half crazed at the time. The finding as to the conduct and crazed condition of Markus at the time, and the further finding to the effect that he had at most only an imaginery grievance against the plaintiff, makes the finding equivalent to one that on the night in question Markus was insane and dangerous to those about him, and that he injured the plaintiff because of this condition. It appears from the finding that it was a condition of the plaintiff's employment at the time in question that he was unwittingly working with an insane fellow employee armed with two loaded revolvers, whose insanity impelled him to shoot the contents of the revolver into the body of the plaintiff, and severely injure him. The plaintiff claims that the injury so received not only arose in the course of the employment but out of it.

The course of the hearings before the commissioner and the arguments of counsel before us indicate that in this case the basis upon which the Workmen's Compensation Act rests was largely overlooked. The portions of the finding sought to be corrected are portions in which the commissioner finds facts to the effect that the defendants ought to have known the dangerous condition of mind of Markus, and that therefore they were at fault in continuing him in their employ.

It is of course, immaterial in this proceeding whether or not the defendants were at fault. Under the act a contract existed between the plaintiff and the defendants whereby they agreed to compensate the plaintiff for any injury " arising out of...