Bartlett v. Everett Products, Inc.
| Decision Date | 01 April 1965 |
| Docket Number | No. 3200,3200 |
| Citation | 208 A.2d 530,99 R.I. 476 |
| Parties | Olga S. BARTLETT v. EVERETT PRODUCTS, INC. Eq. |
| Court | Rhode Island Supreme Court |
Dick & Carty, Joseph E. Marran, Jr., Providence, for petitioner.
Matthew E. Ward, Providence, for respondent.
This is an employee's petition to review a decree of the workmen's compensation commission wherein the respondent was ordered to make payments for total and partial incapacity and wherein it was found that the petitioner's incapacity had terminated as of November 9, 1960. The instant petition, filed on January 9, 1963, was denied and dismissed after a hearing by a trial commissioner. The full commission, after a hearing on the petitioner's appeal from the decree of the trial commissioner, affirmed that decree, and the petitioner is prosecuting an appeal therefrom in this court.
The trial commissioner found 'That the petitioner has failed to prove by a fair preponderance of credible evidence that any incapacity for work which she had subsequent to November 9, 1960 was due to an injury sustained on May 9, 1959.' On appeal the full commission expressly affirmed this finding, which on its face appears to be that petitioner had failed to establish a causal connection between some presently existing incapacity to earn and the injury of May 9, 1959. However, in its decision the full commission appears to have viewed it as a finding that 'petitioner had failed to prove by the weight of the evidence that she has had a return or increase in incapacity as a result of her injury of May 9, 1959,' or, to put it otherwise, she had proved no loss of present earning capacity as a result of that injury. The full commission clearly attached significance to the impartial medical examiner's testimony that 'not only could the petitioner do the same work which she had been doing at the time of her injury but that also her condition was approximately the same as it had been when he had seen her earlier on October 15, 1960.'
The petitioner's only contention in this court is directed at the competence of evidence given through an impartial medical examiner. She argues that his testimony that she could perform the work she had been doing at the time of her injury was based upon a misconception of the evidence which described the duties required of her in the performance of that work. She directs our attention to his stated opinion that work which required lifting and bending could not be performed by her. This is the basis of petitioner's argument that there is in the record no competent evidence upon which the commission's finding as to her failure to establish incapacity could be rested.
The petitioner testified that she had been injured on May 9, 1959 while employed by respondent as an inspector of hypodermic needles. She described her work as inspecting them for defects and stated that it was a part of her duty to carry boxes of such needles to the work bench, which required her to lift and carry boxes that she believed weighed more than twenty-five pounds. She disclosed also that she was not required to remove these boxes of needles after inspection, this being done apparently by another employee of respondent. Both petitioner and her attending physician testified that she presently was unable to perform work of any nature, including her household chores.
Apart from the evidence adduced through petitioner and her attending physician, the only other testimony appearing in the record was given by the impartial medical examiner, who, it appears, had examined petitioner once in 1960 and again in 1963. He stated that it was his opinion that petitioner 'was able to return to the kind of work that she described as her job,--that of an inspector of hypodermic needles,--I felt that she...
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Leviton Mfg. Co. v. Lillibridge
...herein is in effect a challenge to the probative force of the testimony of the employer's medical expert. Bartlett v. Everett Products, Inc., 99 R.I. 476, 208 A.2d 530 (1965). The employee argues that in light of the admission of the employer's expert on cross-examination that she would "ha......
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Kilsey v. Chuck Wagon, Inc.
...upon this court. Martines v. Terminal Methods, Inc., 101 R.I. 599, 602, 225 A.2d 790, 792 (1967); Bartlett v. Everett Products, Inc., 99 R.I. 476, 479, 208 A.2d 530, 532 (1965). The second prong of the employee's attempted rebuttal of the operative presumption is his contention that he was ......
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Delage v. Imperial Knife Co., Inc., 76-120-A
...to prove a disability were supported by legally competent evidence and will not be disturbed by this court. Bartlett v. Everett Products, Inc., 99 R.I. 476, 208 A.2d 530 (1965). The petitioner's other contention is that the findings of the trial commissioner were against the law because the......