Burnight v. Industrial Acc. Commission

• Decision Date: 17 June 1960
• Docket Number: No. 19088,19088
• Citation: 5 Cal.Rptr. 786,181 Cal.App.2d 816
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: June I. BURNIGHT, Petitioner, v. INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENT COMMISSION of the State of California, W. P. Fuller & Company and Fireman's Fund Indemnity Company, Respondents.

Page 786

5 Cal.Rptr. 786

181 Cal.App.2d 816

June I. BURNIGHT, Petitioner, v. INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENT COMMISSION of the State of California, W. P. Fuller & Company and Fireman's Fund Indemnity Company, Respondents.

No. 19088.

District Court of Appeal, First District, Division 1, California.

June 17, 1960.

Hearing Denied Aug. 10, 1960.

William A. White, Edward A. Barry, San Francisco, for petitioner.

Everett A. Corten, Emily B. Johnson, San Francisco, for Industrial Accident Commission.

Hanna & Brophy, San Francisco, for Fireman's Fund Indemnity Co.

BRAY, Presiding Justice.

Petitioner seeks to review an order of the respondent commission made after reconsideration, annulling an award to her of a death benefit in the sum of $10,000.

Question Presented.

Was there any substantial evidence that the suicide of petitioner's husband was not proximately caused by the industrial injury suffered by him?

Record.

Decedent was employed by W. P. Fuller & Company as a paint chemist from 1935 until his death in September, 1957, except for two periods of military service in 1942 to 1946 and 1951 to 1952. In 1951 he was a patient in a service hospital for about three months, suffering from what was diagnosed as manic depressive psychosis with schizophrenic and paranoid tendencies. The hospital records state that this illness was not a result of or aggravated by his service. He received a medical discharge.

In June, 1957, he was sent by his employer to Ensenada, Mexico, to supervise the conversion of a recently acquired paint plant. While there he experienced many difficulties and frustrations. He spoke no Spanish and had to transact business through an interpreter. He worked long hours, ate at irregular hours, had difficulty working out paint formulas and having them ready for production by the Mexican management; he was unfamiliar with certain purchasing, installation and administrative duties assigned to him, and worried about his ability to handle them and about his expense account. He worked against a deadline. Worrying about all these he began to experience difficulty in sleeping, was unduly tired, had night sweats, palpitations and stomach upsets. He had difficulty 'making up his mind about anything.' About September 1 he visited a psychiatrist in Los Angeles who gave him medication and advised rest. About September 6 he 'blacked out' and was attended in his motel room by his employer's doctor, Doctor Trevino. September 9 he was hospitalized in Ensenada where he remained until September 14. Doctor Trevino felt at first that his condition was caused by overwork and malnutrition, but on closer examination concluded that decedent was in an abnormal condition, 'something like' schizophrenia, and advised that he be sent to a psychiatrist. Doctor Trevino stated that his opinion had no merit before that of a psychiatrist and that he could not diagnose decedent's symptoms accurately. Decedent returned to San Francisco and was admitted to St. Francis Hospital September 18, 1957. He was discharged September 21. Doctor Whitsell who attended him wrote that his 'diagnostic impression was 1) acute anxiety reaction with depressive and schizoid features, and 2) encephalopathy due to Vitamin B deficiency.' After discharge from the hospital he was referred to Doctor Hamilton, a psychiatrist, who saw him September 24. On September 27, decedent and his wife got up late. He seemed somewhat shaky but talked rationally. He helped arrange furniture in the apartment. He shaved as usual with an electric razor. About noon he left, stating that he was going to see Doctor Hamilton but if he had time might take a therapy treatment first.

About 12:15 p. m. he registered at a small, cheap hotel on Sixth Street, stating that he would be there 'just tonight.' His signature on the registration sheet was written in a scrawl so that the clerk had to ask how it was spelled. He gave a fictitious Los Angeles address as his residence. The next morning he was found dead, sitting in the bathtub which was half full of bloody water. The readial artery of his right wrist was severed. A single-edge razor blade lay on the bottom of the tub under his right thigh. A blade wrapper was nearby on a shelf. On the bedroom dresser was an open package of single-edge razor blades. He left no note.

Petitioner, the widow, filed an application for compensation benefits. After hearings the referee found that decedent 'was subjected to stress situations arising out of and occurring in the course of his employment which precipitated the nervous breakdown and manic depressive psychosis on September 6, 1957, and said injury proximately caused the death of said employee by suicide' and awarded petitioner a burial allowance, medical reimbursement, attorneys' fees and a death benefit of $10,000. On reconsideration, the commission annulled the referee's findings and award, found that decedent for several months prior to September 6, 1957, 'was subjected to stress situations arising out of and occurring in the course of his employment which precipitated his nervous breakdown and manic depressive psychosis on September, and manic depressive psychosis on September found: 'The death of said employee by suicide on September 27, 1958, [sic] was not proximately caused by the injury herein.' It then awarded petitioner only medical reimbursement and a modified attorneys' fee.

Was The Employee's Suicide The Proximate Result of The Industrial Injury?

Under well established rules our task is to determine whether there is any substantial evidence that it was not, for if there is any such evidence we are bound by the commission's findings. There was testimony that prior to his assignment to Mexico decedent was a gregarious individual and a 'normal human being.' There is ample evidence (in fact, none to the contrary) that, as found by the commission, decedent's 'nervous breakdown and manic depressive psychosis' was precipitated by and in the course of his employment. The finding on this subject is not contested.

This brings us to the evidence concerning the suicide. Doctor Whitsell reported: 'It is my opinion that his suicide occurred as a result of a mental illness which was precipitated by the unusual stress associated with the work to which he was assigned in Mexico.' Doctor Finley, a psychiatrist on whose testimony apparently the commission made its finding that decedent's suicide was a voluntary act, testified: 'Oh, I believe he carried this out [the suicide] on a volitional basis, because he was depressed and this is one of the concerns we have for this type of patient, that they will plan to take their own lives.' (Emphasis added.) The doctor gave as his reasons for thinking decedent's suicide was a voluntary act decedent's actions in registering at the hotel, purchasing razor blades when ordinarily he used an electric razor, and that 'this was something that had been planned over a period of probably several hours, I believe in a condition which the patient suffers in being depressed.' The doctor felt that decedent was aware of the purpose of his act, had the mental capacity to and did realize its consequences, and did it intending to terminate his life. Doctor Finley opined that decedent was suffering from a 'manic depressive disorder' and seriously doubted that decedent's work in Mexico played any part in its development, pointing out that he had a similar illness in 1951; that while at Letterman Hospital it appeared that decedent had other stresses, 'personal problems in his family life, care of a polio brother, attention to his father that went on for sometime.' While the witness did not have an opinion as to what caused decedent's manic depressive condition, he was positive that it was not due to the fatigue and long hours of work connected with decedent's employment. He flatly disagreed with Doctor Whitsell's opinion. While the commission went along with Doctor Finley's opinion on the suicide question, it found against him on his conclusion that decedent's manic depressive condition was not due to industrial injury.

Were this a civil action for damages, the joining together of the commission's finding that decedent's manic depressive condition was caused by his employment with the testimony of Doctor Whitsell that the suicide was the result of the overwork, and Doctor Finley's testimony that suicide is one of the results of such a condition for which the doctors have to look out, a court would be compelled to find that the industrial injury was at least a contributing factor in decedent's death, even though, as opined by Doctor Finley, decedent's act in taking his own life was a voluntary one, in the sense that he committed it with full knowledge of what he was doing.

Recently this court, in Tate v. Canonica, 180 Cal.App.2d 898, 5 Cal.Rptr. 28 dealt with the question of liability for suicide resulting from a civil injury. There we pointed out that originally in this country the rule in civil actions was that there could be no liability for a negligent act causing a mental condition resulting in suicide, regardless of whether the one taking his own life was sane or insane. Later the rule was changed so that if the suicide was committed while the person committing it was insane or in a frenzy, liability would attach to the person causing that condition, but would not attach were the suicide's mental condition less than insanity or frenzy. The main reason for these rules was that the act of suicide, if committed when the person doing it had sufficient mental condition to know what he was doing, was considered to be an independent intervening cause, and to be wilfully inflicted. We then set forth that in some jurisdictions the rule now being applied, and the one which should be applied in California (and the more realistic rule), is that where the injured person has a condition of insanity resulting from the injury which either prevents him from realizing the nature of...