Foughty v. Ott
| Citation | 80 W.Va. 88 |
| Parties | Foughty v. Ott, State Compensation Commissioner. |
| Decision Date | 27 March 1917 |
| Court | Supreme Court of West Virginia |
1. Master and Servant Workmen's Compensation Act Employees
Included Place of Injury.
An employee employed by any person, firm, association or corporation, in carrying on any form of industry or business in this state, and who is not employed wholly without the state, is an employee protected by the provisions of our Workmen's Compensation Act, though his injuries or death be sustained while performing some of his duties in an adjoining state. (p. 89).
2. Same Workmen's Compensation Act Liability Election.
The principles enunciated in Gooding v. Ott, State Compensation Commissioner, 77 W. Va. 487, 87 S. E. 862, re-affirmed. (p. 89).
3. Same Workmen's Compensation Act Claim Additional Evidence.
Where the facts concerning a claim for compensation, arising under said act, are not sufficiently developed by evidence presented by the claimant to, or upon inspection or evidence procured by, the compensation commissioner, to enable him or the court to arrive at the real merits of the claim, an order may be entered here requiring the commissioner to permit claimant to present or to himself obtain additional evidence, if any, properly to present the case, and if the claim be thereby sustained to ascertain and pay the compensation to which the claimant may be entitled. (p. 91).
Appeal from Order of State Compensation Commissioner.
Proceedings under the Workmen's Compensation Act by Mrs. Mont Foughty to obtain compensation for the death of her husband, Mont Foughty, while employed by the Southern Torpedo Company. Compensation was denied by Lee Ott, Compensation Commissioner, and the petitioner appeals.
Remanded to State Compensation Commissioner, with leave to claimant to furnish additional proof.
Simms & Staker, for appellant.
E. T. England, Attorney General, Frank Lively, Assistant Attorney General, and S. B. Avis, for appellee.
Claimant is the widow of Mont Foughty, an oil well shooter, employee of the Southern Torpedo Company, a corporation engaged in the business of "manufacturing nitroglycerine and shooting oil and gas wells", with factory and principal place of business in this state. Prior to the death of Foughty said company had applied for and was duly qualified under the Workmen's Compensation Act, of this state, covering its said business.
The record shows that Foughty resided in Lincoln County, this state, and was employed by, and had been in the service of said company, in shooting oil wells for several years prior to March 6, 1916, when he was killed by an explosion of nitroglycerine while engaged in shooting or preparing to shoot an oil well in the State of Kentucky, just across the West Virginia line two or three miles.
The commissioner denied claimant participation in the Workmen's Compensation fund upon several grounds: First, that the injuries of deceased were not sustained in West Virginia, in the course of his employment, but in Kentucky; Second, that the torpedo company, employer, in shooting oil and gas wells in Kentucky was not an employer regularly employing other persons for profit, or for the purpose of carrying on any form of industry in this state, wherefore claimant is not entitled to participate in said compensation fund; Third, as he construes it, our law is compulsory, not elective, or voluntary, nor a part of the contract of employment, and has no extra territorial effect to cover injuries occurring without the state. Other reasons argumentative in character and based on the commissioner's construction of the statute are also given.
On the first ground assigned by the commissioner there is apparently no evidence in the record showing whether deceased was employed to shoot oil and gas wells in West Virginia, or whether in fact he had ever done any shooting of wells in this state. If, as may be the fact, he was employed to shoot oil wells in this state, though his duties may have also extended to shooting wells in Kentucky, we think for reasons given in Gooding v. Ott,...
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Bradford Electric Light Co. v. Clapper
...R. 1336; Rounsaville v. Railroad Co., 87 N. J. Law, 371, 94 A. 392; Pierce v. Storage Co., 185 Iowa, 1346, 172 N. W. 191; Foughty v. Ott, 80 W. Va. 88, 92 S. E. 143; State ex rel. Chambers v. District Court, 139 Minn. 205, 166 N. W. 185, 3 A. L. R. 1347; Anderson v. Miller Scrap Iron Co., 1......
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Lester v. State Workmen's Compensation Com'r
...Court extended the benefits and protection of the Act to certain out-of-state accidents. Our Court followed Gooding in Foughty v. Ott, 80 W.Va. 88, 92 S.E. 143 (1917), and has applied the "contract theory" in many subsequent decisions involving claims by dependents without any analysis of t......
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Bell v. Vecellio & Grogan, Inc.
...would benefit from West Virginia's workers' compensation laws are compatible with the results of this case. See Syllabus Point 1, Foughty v. Ott, 80 W.Va. 88, 92 S.E. 143 (1917) ("An employee employed by any person, firm, association or corporation, in carrying on any form of industry or bu......
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Hudson v. State Workmen's Compensation Com'r
...the Commissioner for further development. Pripich v. State Compensation Commissioner, 112 W.Va. 540, 166 S.E. 4 (1932); Foughty v. Ott, 80 W.Va. 88, 92 S.E. 143 (1917). Given the strength of the inference that Mr. Hudson's death was caused by lung disease contracted during the course of and......