Schneider v. F. & C. Haerter

• Decision Date: 18 February 1938
• Docket Number: No. 204.,204.
• Citation: 119 N.J.L. 548,197 A. 281
• Parties: SCHNEIDER v. F. & C. HAERTER
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

197 A. 281

119 N.J.L. 548

SCHNEIDER

v. F. & C. HAERTER

No. 204.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

February 18, 1938.

Proceeding under the Workmen's Compensation Act by Eleanor Schneider for the death of her husband, claimant, opposed by F. & C. Haerter, employer. Judgment awarding compensation to the claimant, and the employer brings certiorari.

Writ dismissed.

Argued October term, 1937, before BROGAN, C. J., and TRENCHARD and PARKER, JJ.

Walter X. Trumbull, of Newark, for appellant. Meehan Brothers, of Jersey City (John J. Meehan, of Jersey City, of counsel), for respondent.

PER CURIAM.

This is a workman's compensation case. The referee who heard the case in the bureau determined that the petitioner had failed to sustain the burden of proving that the decedent (husband of the petitioner) died as the result of an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment and the petition was dismissed. On appeal, the common pleas court reversed the finding of the bureau, holding that the decedent "met with an accident within the meaning of the Workmen's Compensation Act [Comp.St. Supps. § **236 —1 et seq.] which resulted in his death," and allowed costs and counsel fee. Certiorari was allowed, and we therefore proceed to examine the proofs in the record before us.

It appears that the deceased was a carpenter and, on the day in question, was working as such in the employ of the respondent; that he had been on this particular job for twenty-five working days; that on the date of the alleged accident, August 2, 1935, it was a "tremendous hot day." Decedent and his fellow workman were engaged carrying lumber a distance of a block and a half, then up to a scaffold 18 or 20 feet above the ground. The decedent was perspiring very freely and his fellow workman, Milega, had "to keep pushing him along." The temperature, according to this witness, was 90 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade; that he advised the decedent to go down to the cellar to get a drink of cold water and, when next he saw him, five minutes later, decedent was lying on the ground in an unconscious condition. The lumber which deceased had been carrying was 4x4x18, and each piece was said to have weighed between 75 and 100 pounds. Prior to noon of that day, the decedent and five other men were engaged in carrying 500-pound window sashes. This work was done in the open, where he was unprotected from the sun's rays.

This witness, Milega, further testified that the men were being rushed with the work and that they had to "work fast."

A medical expert witness, Dr. Dolganos, testifying for the petitioner, said that the death caused by "syncope due to myocardial heart...