Chapman v. Meyers, 94-261

• Decision Date: 13 July 1995
• Docket Number: No. 94-261,94-261
• Citation: 899 P.2d 48
• Parties: In the Matter of the Worker's Compensation Claim of: Brad CHAPMAN, Appellant (Employee-Claimant), v. Anderson MEYERS, Appellee (Employer-Respondent), and State of Wyoming, ex rel., Wyoming Worker's Compensation Division, Appellee (Objector-Defendant).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Page 48

899 P.2d 48

In the Matter of the Worker's Compensation Claim of Brad CHAPMAN, Appellant (Employee-Claimant), v. Anderson MEYERS, Appellee (Employer-Respondent) and State of Wyoming, ex rel., Wyoming Worker's Compensation Division, Appellee (Objector-Defendant).

No. 94-261.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

July 13, 1995.

Dick L. Kahl, Powell, for appellant.

No appearance, for appellee Anderson Meyers.

Richard J. Albanese, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Powell, for appellee State of Wyoming ex rel. Worker's Compensation Div.

Before GOLDEN, C.J., and THOMAS, MACY, TAYLOR and LEHMAN, JJ.

GOLDEN, Chief Justice.

In this appeal we decide whether injuries suffered by an employee in an automobile accident while returning home from work are compensable under the Wyoming Worker's Compensation Act. A hearing examiner determined the employee was not within the course and scope of his employment and denied benefits. The district court affirmed that decision.

We also affirm.

Appellant Brad Chapman raises these issues:

1. Did the required "nexus" exist between Employee/Claimant's employment and the accident in which the Employee/Claimant was injured?

2. Were the injuries suffered by Employee/Claimant in a motor vehicle accident caused by a "special risk" associated with his employment and thus compensable under the Worker's Compensation Act?

3. Did the District Judge in affirming the decision of the Hearing Examiner apply an incorrect definition of "injury"?

The Worker's Compensation Division states these issues:

1. Whether the Employee-Claimant's claim for benefits is foreclosed by the "going to and coming from" rule contained in prior case law of the Wyoming Supreme Court as well as Wyoming Statute Section 27-14-102(a)(xi)(D) (1993) and Wyoming Statute Section 27-311(n) (1977)?

2. Whether the so-called "special risk" exception applies in this case or whether that exception exists in Wyoming?

Chapman filed his claim for worker's compensation benefits on September 7, 1990, asserting he had suffered an injury on December 6, 1984 ¹, while in the course and scope of his employment. After three years of proceedings, Chapman's case came on for hearing on its merits. ² The record does not provide a very clear picture of the facts which govern the result in this case. We perceive these to be the material facts which were relied upon by the hearing examiner in reaching his decision.

After completing his work shift on December 6, 1984, Chapman left his job on a drilling rig located near Hayden, Colorado, to return home to Wyoming to visit his family for several days. The rig crew lived in a motel in Craig, Colorado. Chapman was traveling in a vehicle owned by the wife of a co-employee. Chapman and three other employees car-pooled from Craig to the rig site. The employees were not reimbursed for travel to and from the rig, nor was a travel allowance paid as part of overall wages. The road leading to the rig was a two-lane, graveled, public road through a mountainous area. The road was snow-packed the day of the accident. Approximately one mile from the rig, the vehicle in which Chapman rode collided head-on with a tanker truck heading to the rig. In that collision Chapman suffered severe injuries when he was thrown from the back seat of the vehicle into the windshield.

Loren Martinez was one of the other passengers in the vehicle with Chapman and it was his task to bring a water jug filled with water to and from work with the group. He did not know who owned the water jug, though another co-employee believed it had been given to the employees by the employer.

This court has settled the standard for reviewing factual findings made in worker's compensation hearings. If, after examining the entire record, we discern substantial evidence to support the agency's findings, we will not substitute our judgment for that of the agency. Under such circumstances we must uphold the agency's findings. Britton v. Halliburton Services, 895 P.2d 45, 46-47 (Wyo.1995); Jaqua v. Wyoming Workers' Compensation Div., 873 P.2d 1219, 1220 (Wyo.1994).

We begin our analysis from the vantage point of a well-established rule. Ordinarily an employee is not within the course of employment when he is injured going to and from work. Railworks, Inc. v. Naylor, 723 P.2d 1237, 1241 (Wyo.1986); Corean v. Wyoming Worker's Compensation Div., 723 P.2d 58, 61 (Wyo.1986); Western Power Service & Constr. v. Van Matre, 657 P.2d 815, 816 (Wyo.1983); H.K. Ferguson Co. v. Willey, 571 P.2d 248, 250-51 (Wyo.1977) ³.

Chapman contends his employer required, and contemplated, that its employees would not be able to live at the well site. Rather, of necessity, they would have to live in Craig and commute to the rig. Therefore, he argues, there is a sufficient nexus between the injury and his employment to require compensation. Chapman does not provide us with the benefit of much authority on this point. Under the factual circumstances outlined above, we are not persuaded Chapman was in the course and scope of his employment merely while driving to and from the work site under what can only be described as relatively typical (in Wyoming/Colorado) commuting circumstances. See Cody v. North Dakota Workmen's Compensation Bureau, 413 N.W.2d 316 (N.D.1987); Clark v. Daniel Morine Constr. Co., 98 Idaho 114, 559 P.2d 293, 294 (1977); Stark v. L.E. Myers Co., 58 Mich.App. 439, 228 N.W.2d 411 (1975); see 1 ARTHUR LARSON, THE LAW OF WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION, § 16 (1995).

Chapman contends the presence of an employer's water can in the vehicle provides the necessary nexus to sustain his claim. The record is hazy as to exactly who owned the water can and whether it benefitted only Chapman's immediate group of employees, or both the employer and the employees. There are a number of cases on this subject of which we shall make note.

For instance, in Hackfeld v. Pacific Employers Insurance Co., 393 S.W.2d 720 (Tex.Civ.App.1965), the court held the presence of a water can belonging to an employer did not change the fact the employees were going to and from work and were not in the course of employment. Also see Henshaw v. Texas Employers' Insurance Ass'n, 282 S.W.2d 928 (Tex.Civ.App.1955); Travelers Insurance Co. v. Forson, 268 S.W.2d 219 (Tex.Civ.App.1954).

On the other hand, in Ince v. Chester Westfall Drilling Co., 346 P.2d 346 (Okla.1959), concerning an employee killed in an automobile accident while returning home from work, the employee was carrying an empty water can which the employer owned and the water was used by the drilling crew while on the job. The reviewing court reversed the determinations of the trial judge and the Industrial Commission that the injury had not arisen out of and in the course of employment. Ince, 346 P.2d at 348 (and cases cited therein); and see Hughes v. Haco Drilling Co., 340 P.2d 472 (Okla.1959). Sustaining a jury award on the basis that the question was one for the jury and the evidence sufficient, the Fifth Circuit held that an employee killed while on his way to an ice house to obtain ice for the drilling crew's water can could have been within the course and scope of his employment. Associated Indemnity Corp. v. Bush, 201 F.2d 843 (5th Cir.1953); and see Janak v. Texas Employers' Insurance Ass'n, 381 S.W.2d 176 (Tex.1964) (remanding for further consideration of a similar question).

In fleshing out his contentions in this regard, Chapman relies on our decision in Corean v. Wyoming Worker's Compensation Div., 723 P.2d 58 (Wyo.1986). In that case we reaffirmed and clarified a rule which focuses on the nexus between the injury and the employment. We held that where an employee was carrying his employer's tools in his truck and had entered the zone where the employment took place, and the employer thereby benefitted, the injuries suffered by the employee in a one car accident were compensable. Corean, 723 P.2d at 61-63; and see Richard v. Wyoming Worker's Compensation Div., 831 P.2d 244, 247 (Wyo.1992). In this instance, the hearing examiner found that the presence of the water can was not a significant benefit to the employer; indeed, any connection of the employer with the water can is equivocal. We hold there is substantial evidence to support the hearing examiner's findings to that effect.

Chapman contends his employment was attended by a "special risk," principally the winding mountain road which led to the rig. We...