Culpepper v. Fairfield Sapphire Valley, 8810IC419

• Decision Date: 04 April 1989
• Docket Number: No. 8810IC419,8810IC419
• Citation: 377 S.E.2d 777,93 N.C.App. 242
• Court: North Carolina Court of Appeals
• Parties: Deborah Pharr CULPEPPER, Employee, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. FAIRFIELD SAPPHIRE VALLEY, Employer, Aetna Casualty & Surety Company, Carrier, Defendants-Appellees.

Page 777

377 S.E.2d 777

93 N.C.App. 242

Deborah Pharr CULPEPPER, Employee, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. FAIRFIELD SAPPHIRE VALLEY, Employer, Aetna Casualty & Surety Company, Carrier, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 8810IC419.

Court of Appeals of North Carolina.

April 4, 1989.

Parker, Poe, Thompson, Bernstein, Gage, & Preston by Max E. Justice and William L. Brown, Charlotte, and Ball, Kelley, & Arrowood, P.A. by Phillip G. Kelley, Asheville, for plaintiff-appellant.

Russell & King, P.A. by Sandra M. King and Kathy A. Gleason, Asheville, for defendants-appellees.

BECTON, Judge.

A cocktail waitress employed at a mountain resort filed this workers' compensation claim to recover for injuries sustained when she tried to escape from a guest of the resort who kidnapped and sexually assaulted her. The attack occurred after the employee's workday ended when she stopped on a resort road to assist the guest, who she assumed had car trouble. The Industrial Commission held that the employee's injuries did not arise out of and in the course of her employment, and denied workers' compensation benefits. We reverse.

I

The result of this case, like most workers' compensation cases, turns upon its unique facts. The relevant facts follow.

Fairfield Sapphire Valley, the defendant-employer, is an extensive resort community located in a remote region of the western North Carolina mountains. The plaintiff-employee, Deborah Pharr Culpepper, worked as a bartender and cocktail waitress at Sapphire Valley Country Club, a club within the resort open only to the resort's members and guests. She sometimes worked as a bartender and food waitress at the Fairfield Inn, also part of the resort complex.

Ms. Culpepper was instructed when she was hired "to be very cordial and friendly and nice and [to] offer any assistance that [she] could " to members and guest since "[m]ost of the people coming up there were looking at buying property" at the resort. (Emphasis added.) She was directed to serve only members and guests, and was told who those people were. One of the guests pointed out to her was Ralph Harvey Henry. Ms. Culpepper had served Mr. Henry a number of times at the country club and at the Inn, and he phoned her once while she was on duty to ask for a date. She politely declined. They had no contact outside her serving duties.

About 11:00 p.m. on 17 August 1981, Ms. Culpepper finished her work at the country club and drove to the Fairfield Inn, traversing both the resort's private roads and Highway 64 to get there. Access to the resort's recreational, dining, lodging, and other facilities was by a system of private roads branching off Highway 64. The public highway ran the length of and through the middle of the resort community, and provided the only means of entering or exiting the resort. Ms. Culpepper parked in front of the Inn and went in to turn in the day's proceeds and paperwork. She saw Mr. Henry sitting at the bar. When Ms. Culpepper finished her work and left the Inn, she discovered that Mr. Henry had pulled his car alongside hers and was standing at her car door. He asked her to go out with him. She again politely declined, this time explaining that she planned to say goodbye to a co-worker who was leaving the next day. She was "trying to be nice [since] he was a guest at the [I]nn...."

Uncomfortable about this encounter, Ms. Culpepper waited for Mr. Henry to leave before she drove out of the parking lot. Once he was out of sight, she drove down the resort road leading away from the Inn. She turned right onto Highway 64, driving in the direction of her home. Before she reached the perimeter of the resort, she exited the highway, turning left onto the unlit resort road leading to the country club. The road also led to the employees' quarters, where her friend who was leaving stayed.

Ms. Culpepper slowed down when she saw a car stopped at the side of the road with its flashers blinking. A person stood in the road waving his arms, motioning her to stop. As she got nearer, Ms. Culpepper saw that the person was Mr. Henry. Assuming he had car trouble, she "stopped to see if he needed help or wanted [her] to tell someone ... to go get him." Because "he was a guest and since he was on th[e resort] property, ... [she] felt like it would be a good thing to do to stop and see if he needed help."

Mr. Henry walked over to Ms. Culpepper's car, leaned down to talk though the window, and then yanked the door open, forcing his way into the driver's seat. Ms. Culpepper jumped out the passenger side, and ran down the road. Henry caught her, struck her in the face, and forced her, kicking and screaming, into his car. He drove her to a secluded area where, after repeatedly threatening to kill her, he sexually assaulted her.

Ms. Culpepper eventually talked Henry into returning to her car on the pretense that she would go out with him. As they started down the resort road where the attack first began, they saw people standing around her car, apparently concerned because her door was ajar and the headlights were still on. Henry sped up to get away. Fearing for her life, Ms. Culpepper leaped headfirst from his car. Her ankle caught in the door. Her body struck the pavement and was dragged along the roadway until her foot came free.

The fall from the car left Ms. Culpepper with a skull fracture and injuries to her back, leg, and face. As a result of her head injury, she suffered partial hearing loss, partial loss of the sense of taste, and complete loss of the sense of smell.

II

Ms. Culpepper filed a claim for workers' compensation benefits.

Following a hearing, Deputy Commissioner McCrodden entered an interlocutory opinion and award in which she found that Ms. Culpepper's job as a cocktail waitress put her "at an increased risk of being confronted by male customers" and that the directive to be hospitable to guests at the resort "placed [her] in the position in which she found herself with Ralph Henry." (Emphasis added.) McCrodden concluded that "when plaintiff stopped to aid a guest of defendant-employer on the [employer's] premises ..., she was acting in the scope of her employment ..., and her injury arose in the course of that employment." McCrodden further concluded that Ms. Culpepper was "entitled to the compensable consequences of her injury by accident arising out of and in the course of her employment...."

Deputy Commissioner Burgwyn later entered a separate opinion and award ordering the employer to pay Ms. Culpepper (1) $17,500 for her permanent injuries, (2) temporary total disability for a two-month period, and (3) all medical expenses incurred for treatment of her injuries. The employer appealed to the Full Commission.

The Full Commission vacated and reversed the interlocutory opinion and award. The Commission denied Ms. Culpepper compensation, finding that she "diverted from her direction home on a private mission...." The Commission also made the following findings of fact:

1. ... In her service to defendant employer's customers, plaintiff was directed to be cordial at all times while on duty since guests were prospective home buyers.

* * *

7. The configuration of the roads in the Fairfield complex were such that in leaving her final place of duty ... plaintiff normally drove home by way of U.S. Highway 64. This is a public highway that runs through the resort community. Her diversion off of this road into the private road owned by the resort community was for a mission and purpose personal to her and not connected with the interests of her employer.

(Emphasis added.) The Commission concluded as a matter of law that Ms. Culpepper "was acting on a personal mission ... and was not under any employment duty to travel upon that road or to stop to assist anyone being located on that road. Consequently, her injury by accident did not arise out of [and in the course of] her employment...." (Emphasis added.)

III

Ms. Culpepper appealed to this court, contending that she is entitled to compensation because her injuries did arise out of and in the course of her employment.

A. Injuries Compensable Under the Workers' Compensation Act

An injury is compensable under the Workers' Compensation Act only if the injury (1) is an "accident" and (2) "aris[es] out of and in the course of the employment." N.C.Gen.Stat.Sec. 97-2(6) (1985). Whether an injury arose out of and in the course of employment is a mixed question of law and fact, and the Industrial Commission's findings in this regard are conclusive on appeal if supported by competent evidence. Gallimore v. Marilyn's Shoes, 292 N.C. 399, 402, 233 S.E.2d 529, 531 (1977).

Injuries resulting from an assault are caused by "accident" within the meaning of the Act when, from the employee's perspective, the assault was unexpected and was without design on her part. Id. See also Stack v. Mecklenburg County, 86 N.C.App. 550, 554, 359 S.E.2d 16, 18 (1987), disc. rev. denied, 321 N.C. 121, 361 S.E.2d 597 (1987) (injuries from sexual assault may be compensable under the Act). We hold that the Commission correctly concluded that Ms. Culpepper's injuries stemming from the sexual assault were caused by "accident." Thus, the remaining question is whether her injuries "arose out of" and "in the course of" her employment.

The employee must establish both the "arising out of" and "in the course of" requirements to be entitled to compensation. Roberts v. Burlington Indus., Inc. 321 N.C. 350, 354, 364 S.E.2d 417, 420 (1988). However, while the "arising out of" and "in the course of" elements are distinct tests, they are interrelated and cannot be applied entirely independently. Hoyle v. Isenhour Brick & Tile Co., 306 N.C. 248, 252, 293 S.E.2d 196, 199 (1982). Both are part of a single test of work-connection. Watkins v. City of Wilmington, 290 N.C. 276, 281, 225 S.E.2d 577, 581 (1976) (citations omitted). Because "the terms of the Act should be liberally construed in favor of compensation,...