Click v. Pilot Freight Carriers, Inc.

• Decision Date: 06 May 1980
• Docket Number: No. 91,91
• Citation: 265 S.E.2d 389,300 N.C. 164
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: Grady M. CLICK v. PILOT FREIGHT CARRIERS, INC., Employer, Self-Insurer.

Page 389

265 S.E.2d 389

300 N.C. 164

Grady M. CLICK v. PILOT FREIGHT CARRIERS, INC., Employer, Self-Insurer.

No. 91.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

May 6, 1980.

White & Crumpler by Frank J. Yeager, Yeager & Powell, Winston-Salem, for plaintiff-appellee.

Hutchins, Tyndall, Bell, Davis & Pitt by Walter W. Pitt, Jr., and Richard D. Ramsey, Winston-Salem, for defendant-appellant.

EXUM, Justice.

Defendant's appeal challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support the Industrial Commission's findings that plaintiff sustained a compensable injury by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment with defendant. We hold there is competent evidence to support the finding of accident, but remand the case to the Commission to take expert medical evidence on the causal relationship between the accident and the injury complained of.

Plaintiff Grady Click, the employee, was awarded compensation for temporary total disability and a 25 percent permanent partial disability resulting from a herniated disc at the L4-5 interspace. The record discloses that Click gave conflicting stories about the cause of his injury. On 31 August 1976 he was employed as a dock worker by defendant Pilot Freight Carriers, Inc. As he pulled carts off a conveyor line in the dock area of the freight terminal, he felt a pain in his back. He mentioned the pain to two co-workers but continued working until the end of his shift. At home that evening, he experienced a sharp pain in his back when he bent over to take off his socks. The pain was so intense and disabling that he remained in bed until 3 September, at which time he was hospitalized and the herniated disc was subsequently discovered during exploratory surgery. Click told his doctor that he had hurt his back while bending to pick up something from the floor at his home. He submitted insurance forms to another insurer stating that he was injured at home. At the Commission hearing in July, 1977, however, Click testified that he had been struck in the back by a cart while he worked on the conveyor line at a freight terminal on 31 August. Click testified that when he was struck in this manner he "felt a sharp pain in (his) back" which worsened after he returned home from work. He testified that he "went to bed" and "remained in bed until (he) couldn't stand the pain any longer and they took (him) to the hospital." The only medical evidence adduced at the hearing was a statement by Click's physician concerning the nature and extent of Click's injuries. Based upon this evidence, the Commission found that Click had sustained a compensable injury by accident which occurred when plaintiff was struck from the rear by a cart on the conveyor line.

Defendant first assigns error to the Commission's finding that plaintiff was injured as a result of an employment related accident. Defendant argues that the conflicting evidence in this case cannot "reasonably" support a finding of injury by accident inasmuch as plaintiff's testimony before the Commission is contradicted by his earlier statements about the onset of the injury. It is not for a reviewing court, however, to weigh the evidence before the Industrial Commission in a workmen's compensation case. By authority of G.S. 97-86 the Commission is the sole judge of the credibility and weight to be accorded to the evidence and testimony before it. Its findings of fact may be set aside on appeal only when there is a complete lack of competent evidence to support them. Anderson v. Construction Co., 265 N.C. 431, 144 S.E.2d 272 (1965). Thus, if the totality of the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the complainant, tends directly or by reasonable inference to support the Commission's findings, these findings are conclusive on appeal even though there may be plenary evidence to support findings to the contrary. Hollman v. City of Raleigh, 273 N.C. 240, 159 S.E.2d 874 (1968); Keller v. Wiring Co., 259 N.C. 222, 130 S.E.2d 342 (1963). Applying these principles to the instant case, we cannot say as a matter of law that the Commission erred in lending credence to plaintiff's testimony concerning the alleged accident. Plaintiff's testimony was competent even though it was contradicted by his prior statements. Its credibility was for the Commission, not the courts, to determine. Defendant's assignment of error on this point is overruled.

Defendant next contends that the Commission's award cannot stand because there is no expert medical testimony tending to establish a causal relationship between the work related accident and the herniated disc for which compensation is sought. Under the circumstances of this case, we agree.

For an injury to be compensable under the terms of the Workmen's Compensation Act, it must be proximately caused by an accident arising out of and suffered in the course of employment. G.S. 97-2(6). There must be competent evidence to support the inference that the accident in question resulted in the injury complained of, i. e., some evidence that the accident at least might have or could have produced the particular disability in question. The quantum and quality of the evidence required to establish prima facie the causal relationship will of course vary with the complexity of the injury itself. There will be "many instances in which the facts in evidence are such that any layman of average intelligence and experience would know what caused the injuries complained of." Gillikin v. Burbage, 263 N.C. 317, 325, 139 S.E.2d 753, 760 (1965). On the other hand, where the exact nature and probable genesis of a particular type of injury involves...