Pearce v. Mich. Home & Training Sch.

• Decision Date: 16 July 1925
• Docket Number: No. 40.,40.
• Parties: PEARCE v. MICHIGAN HOME AND TRAINING SCHOOL et al.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

231 Mich. 536

204 N.W. 699

PEARCE

v.MICHIGAN HOME AND TRAINING SCHOOL et al.

No. 40.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

July 16, 1925.

Certiorari to Department of Labor and Industry.

Certiorari by the Michigan Home and Training School and another, to review proceedings of the Department of Labor and Industry, awarding to Albert Pearce, guardian, compensation for accidental death of Blanche Burke. Award vacated.

Argued before McDONALD, C. J., and CLARK, BIRD, SHARPE, STEERE, FELLOWS, and WIEST, JJ.Roy Andrus, of Lansing (Kerr, Lacey & Scroggie, of Detroit, or counsel), for appellants.

George W. Des Jardins. of Lapeer, for appellee.

FELLOWS, J.

Plaintiff is the guardian of the two minor children of Blanche Burke, who was an employé of defendant Michigan Home and Training School, a state institution located at Lapeer, which will hereafter be referred to as the institution. Mrs. Burke was employed in the mangle room of the laundry. The laundry closed Saturday noon, and invariably Mr. Burke had a half holiday Saturday afternoons. Her children were at plaintiff's home, and it was her custom to visit them each Saturday afternoon. Frequently her brother-in-law, Mr. Burke, took her there in his machine. Plaintiff also took her there in his machine, and at other times she walked. Saturday afternoon, July 26, 1924, Mrs. Burke had her usual half holiday. In the afternoon of that day her dead body was discovered in the bushes by the side of the highway, usually traveled by her to plaintiff's residence, and some distance, at least a quarter of a mile, from the institution grounds. An examination disclosed there had been no criminal assault. A few days afterwards, one of the inmates of the institution confessed to the murder.

Defendants insist that the death of Mrs. Burke did not arise out of or in the course of her employment. Other points are also raised, but we need not consider them, as it is clear upon this record that her unfortunate death did not occur in the course of her employment. She had finished her work for the week, had left the premises of her employer, and was at least a quarter of a mile away; she was in the performance of no quty to her employer, but upon a mission entirely of her own; she was mistress of her own time, and could go and come as she pleased. We have followed and quoted the rule laid down by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in McNicol's Case, 215 Mass. 497, 102 N. E. 697, L. R. A. 1916A, 306. We quote from that case:

‘It is sufficient to say that an injury is received ‘in the course of’ the employment when it comes while the workman is doing the duty which he is employed to perform. It ‘arises out of’ the employment, when there is apparent to the rational mind, upon consideration of all the circumstances, a causal connection between the conditions under which the work is required to be performed and the resulting injury. Under this test, if the injury can be seen to have followed as a natural incident of the work and to have been contemplated by a reasonable person familiar with the whole situation as a result of the exposure occasioned by the nature of the employment, then it arises ‘out of’ the employment. But it excludes an injury...