Reese v. American Mut. Liability Ins. Co.

• Decision Date: 30 May 1942
• Docket Number: 29509.
• Citation: 20 S.E.2d 773,67 Ga.App. 420
• Parties: REESE v. AMERICAN MUT. LIABILITY INS. CO. et al.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

20 S.E.2d 773

67 Ga.App. 420

REESE v. AMERICAN MUT. LIABILITY INS. CO. et al.

No. 29509.

Court of Appeals of Georgia, Division No. 2.

May 30, 1942

Syllabus Opinion by the Court.

Where approval of settlement between compensation claimant and employer and insurance carrier provided that if any party doubted whether agreement had been made according to law, he might address the department and that any inquiry or complaint would receive prompt attention, there was no "final award" which would deprive the Industrial Board of jurisdiction to permit a reopening of the case within a reasonable time.

Where a man having a living wife enters into a ceremonial marriage with another woman, such purported second marriage is void.

Evidence sustained finding of director that previously to purported marriage with claimant, the deceased had entered into a valid ceremonial marriage with another woman, which marriage had not been dissolved, and that claimant was not entitled to compensation as decedent's "lawful wife".

Where finding of single director that claimant was not entitled to compensation as the lawful wife of decedent because of decedent's undissolved prior marriage to another woman was sustained by the evidence, superior court did not err in affirming the director's award and the award of the board refusing to remand the case to director for taking of additional testimony and affirming the award of the director.

Statement of facts by Sutton, Judge:

Jack Reese, on March 5, 1941, met with an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment with Scripto Manufacturing Company of Atlanta, Georgia, the accident resulting in his death on March 27, 1941. At the time of the accident he was earning $12 per week. Thereafter the employer and insurance carrier made an investigation as to dependency and obtained from Pearlina Harris Reese a written statement that she and Jack Reese were married in Meriwether County Georgia, on September 5, 1915, and from the ordinary of that county a certified copy of a marriage license and certificate thereon which corroborated the claim of Pearlina Harris Reese as to being the wife of the deceased. On April 1, 1941 relying on such evidence, the defendants entered into an agreement with her, in which they agreed to pay her as "wife of the deceased" compensation in accordance with the Georgia Workmen's Compensation Act. Code, § 114-101 et seq. This agreement was filed with and approved in writing by the Industrial Board on April 17, 1941 with a recital in the approval that "If any party in interest doubts that the agreement made has been made strictly according to law, he may address the department with an inquiry or complaint. It will receive prompt attention."

On April 24, 1941, counsel for one Pearl Cooper Reese notified the Industrial Board and defendants that she was the only legal wife of the deceased, and by letter requested that the board assign her claim for a hearing, and also requested that payments of compensation in the weekly sum of $5.10 to Pearlina Harris Reese be stopped. Acting on such letter the Industrial board notified the defendants on April 25, 1941 to discontinue such payments until a hearing could be had and the Board determine the true dependent of the deceased. Thereafter, on May 16, 1941, a hearing was held before a single director, at which time Pearl Cooper Reese was permitted to show, without objection, that she had married the deceased on April 2, 1911, and she introduced in evidence a certified copy of the marriage license and certificate. She testified that Jack Reese left her in 1914 without cause, and that, although he had visited her on several different occasions, and had given her money she had not lived with him as his wife since 1914; that she and the deceased were living in Troup County at the time he left her and that she had lived in that county continously since that time, and that the last time Jack Reese came back was just before Christmas in 1940; that she had never been divorced from him and had never heard of his getting a divorce.

An older brother, Abe Reese, corroborated her testimony. At a subsequent hearing of the case the single director announced that the attorney for Pearl Cooper Reese had withdrawn her claim, and when this was done counsel for Pearlina Harris Reese moved to dismiss the claim of Pearl Cooper Reese and asked that the board make an award reaffirming the award of April 17, 1941. The single director declined to rule on this motion until after the completion of the record, and subsequently to the filing of such motion the defendants were given permission to introduce evidence in support of their contention that the claim of Pearlina Harris Reese was not valid, that she was not the lawful widow of the deceased, and that under the workmen's compensation act she was not entitled to compensation for the death of a man to whom she was not legally married. Thereupon counsel for the defendants testified that he had examined the records of Troup, Meriwether, and Fulton Counties, the only counties in which any of the parties had resided since 1911, and did not find any record of a divorce proceeding between Jack Reese and Pearl Cooper Reese.

At a subsequent hearing Pearl Cooper Reese testified that after Jack Reese left her she went through a marriage ceremony with one Jim Flowers. A certified copy of the marriage license and certificate, which had been put in evidence, showed that the marriage took place on December 30, 1920. She testified that Flowers had been dead five or six years, that she lived in Troup County, and did not know anything about the woman Jack Reese married the last time and was not acquainted with her. Pearlina Harris Reese testified that the insurance carried had paid her four weekly sums of...