Protectu Awning Shutter Co. v. Cline
| Decision Date | 25 January 1944 |
| Parties | PROTECTU AWNING SHUTTER CO. et al. v. CLINE. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Dade County; Paul D. Barns, Ross Williams, and Marshall C. Wiseheart, Judges.
A. Lee Bradford and McKay, Dixon & DeJarnette, all of Miami, and Walter E. Rountree, of Tallahassee, for appellants.
Knight & Green, of Miami, for appellee.
Walter E. Cline age 67, on February 4, 1942, and some time prior thereto, was employed by appellant as a cabinet maker. Cline suffered an ailment of the heart which caused fainting spells. When one of the spells would occur, unless he could recline and relax he would fall and become unconscious. He had been warned by his physician to refrain from undue standing or physical exertion. On this date when he was completing his day's work he suffered one of these spells and fell, striking his head against the concrete floor causing a skull fracture resulting in death. There was no foreign substance on the floor. Death resulted from the skull fracture and not from heart attack.
The Industrial Commission declined an award to the widow. The circuit court awarded compensation. The only question for us to decide is whether the injury arose out of the employment. Our statute affords relief where the injury arises out of and in the course of the employment. The statute was construed by us in Fidelity & Casualty Co. of New York et al. v. Moore, 143 Fla. 103, 196 So. 495, and in Sweat et al. v. Allen, 145 Fla. 733, 200 So. 348. Many cases from other jurisdictions have been cited, a great many of which may be distinguished by reason of different statutory language and others on factual grounds. Frankly, this is a border line case. The judgment is presumptively correct. The purpose of the act is to shoulder on industry the expense incident to the hazards of industry; to lift from the public the burden to support those incapacitated by industry and to ultimately pass on to the consumers of the products of industry such expenses. Our act affords no relief for disease of physicial ailment not produced by industry. The act removes all question of negligence, assumption of risk or wrong-doing on the part of the employer. To our mind what impels us to uphold this judgment, primarily, is that the injury which actually produced death was the fracture.
The fact that Cline suffered from heart disease which, no doubt caused him to fall, does not preclude recovery. The chances are he might have fallen and sustained a fatal injury in his own home yet, it is less likely had he remained in the quiet of his own home, for without the physical exertion encountered in his work by a man of his age and physical...
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Henderson v. Celanese Corp.
...or particular character of the hazard, but because it exists as one of the conditions of the employment'; Protectu Awning Shutter Co. v. Cline, 154 Fla. 30, 16 So.2d 342 (Sup.Ct.1944); American Mut. Liability Ins. Co. v. King, 88 Ga.App. 176, 76 S.E.2d 81 (Ct.App.1953), citing United States......
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Zundell v. Dade County School Bd.
...Id. at 486, 18 So.2d at 258. The same year the supreme court reached its decision in Davis, it also decided Protectu Awning Shutter Co. v. Cline, 154 Fla. 30, 16 So.2d 342 (1944), approving the compensability of benefits for decedent's injury which resulted from a fall caused by an idiopath......
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Gray v. Employers Mut. Liability Ins. Co.
... ... This case is distinguished from the several cases cited in Protectu Awning Shutter Company v. Cline, 154 Fla. 30, ... 16 So.2d 342; Davis v ... ...
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Garcia v. Texas Indemnity Ins. Co.
...Church et al., 122 Conn. 343, 189 A. 599; Gonier v. Chase Companies, 97 Conn. 46, 115 A. 677, 19 A.L.R. 83; Protectu Awning Shutter Co. et al. v. Cline, 154 Fla. 30, 16 So.2d 342; Rewis v. New York Life Ins. Co. et al., 226 N.C. 325, 38 S.E.2d 97; Christensen v. Dysert et al., 42 N.M. 107, ......