Bellamy v. Morace Stevedoring Co., 594

• Decision Date: 12 December 1962
• Docket Number: No. 594,594
• Citation: 258 N.C. 327,128 S.E.2d 395
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: Hiram Van BELLAMY, Employee, v. MORACE STEVEDORING COMPANY, Employer; Travelers Insurance Company, Carrier.

Page 395

128 S.E.2d 395

258 N.C. 327

Hiram Van BELLAMY, Employee, v.MORACE STEVEDORING COMPANY, Employer; Travelers Insurance Company, Carrier.

No. 594

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Dec. 12, 1962

Poisson, Marshall, Barnhill & Williams, by Lonnie B. Williams, Wilmington, for defendants-appellants.

Bowman & Prevatte, by James C. Bowman, Southport, for plaintiff-appellee.

HIGGINS, Justice.

The claimant testified as a witness in his own behalf: 'I remember the morning of March 3, 1960.I was sick a little bit before I left home and then I vomited and I got all right, and then I went * * * down to Sunny Point * * * I moved the first net two or three feet * * * just enough to get by * * * there were two of them * * * Well, when I got so I started to moving it good, I taken a pain in my breast, so I went in the box car and told this man I was sick.He said go to the office, so I did so, * * * I vomited and was just as sick as I could be.* * * I was hurting in my breast and arm.'

On cross-examination, he testified: 'When I moved them, I mean I rolled them.* * * I had not rolled nets too many times before.Its part of a carpenter's duties if he is asked to.* * * There was one man helping me roll the net. * * * I was rolling the net, * * * There was no lifting involved.'

Claimant was a carpenter, 65 years of age.The defendant's evidence indicated that the work of moving nets, etc., was usually done by longshoremen.However, this duty was sometimes assigned to carpenters.In moving a net, 'it is rolled similar to a barrel.'

The claimant's medical expert, a specialist in the field of 'heart conditions,' in response to a hypothetical question involving the effect of physical exertion, said: 'I think it might have been a precipitating or a hastening factor in this situation.As far as being the underlying cause, generally speaking, it is not.I don't think it would be in this case.* * * This man also, besides being at an age where he had a fair amount of arteriosclerosis, had diabetes, which accelerates the arteriosclerotic hardening process, or narrowing or hardening of the arteries.So that actually it happens that people who have myocardial infarctions, such as he did, at least half of them have them when they are at rest * * * or when they are in bed sleeping, I should say--the other half have them when they are awake.So, generally speaking, activity has nothing to do with the production of a myocardial infarction.Now, it is true that a person who is on the verge of having such an attack, by strenuous exertion this could be accelerated or precipitated.'Dr. Tidler testified the claimant told him three men were helping him.

We conclude that so much of finding of fact No. 4 as relates to the heavy and strenuous lifting usually done by...