Scott v. Payne Bros., Inc.

• Decision Date: 25 February 1914
• Citation: 85 N.J.L. 446,89 A. 927
• Parties: SCOTT v. PAYNE BROS., INC.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

89 A. 927

85 N.J.L. 446

SCOTT

v. PAYNE BROS., INC.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Feb. 25, 1914.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Certiorari to Court of Common Pleas, Essex County.

Petition under Workmen's Compensation Act by James Scott against Payne Brothers, Incorporated. Judgment for petitioner, and defendant brings certiorari. Affirmed.

Under the Workmen's Compensation Act of 1911 (P. L. p. 134), the petitioner was employed for an indefinite period at $5 per day to work on a contract for the erection of a structural steel building. He had been working a week when the injury happened. "Scott with two others were pulling on a hand chain connected with a block for the purpose of operating a mechanism which caused a lifting chain to pass through the block and lift a steel girder. In some way, the lifting chain became clogged, probably by the turning or twisting of one of the links, and by being forced through the block it split the block, and Scott, who was sitting with his face within a few inches of the side of the steel block, was struck on the forehead and received a laceration." The statement is quoted from defendant's brief.

Argued November term, 1913, before SWAYZE and BERGEN, JJ.

Thomas Brown, of Perth Amboy, for petitioner.

Frank E. Bradner, of Newark, for defendant.

SWAYZE, J. This was not a case of casual employment. The petitioner was employed in the regular business of the defendant and likely to be retained for some time, and as long as the work remained unfinished. It was not a mere temporary, accidental employment.

The injury was due to an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment That employment was as a structural steel worker upon the building in course of erection; the lifting of the steel girder was a necessary part of the work; the defendant was liable to be called on, as he was, to assist. The suggestion to the contrary is that the men who were pulling continued to do so, although the foreman told them to stop; and the argument is that this disobedience of orders involves the conclusion that what followed was not in the course of the employment. Scott says he did not hear the order to stop, and the judge so found. The case therefore does not involve an accident happening to a petitioner by reason of his own disobedience. We see no reason to doubt that a disobedience of orders by his fellow workmen is as much one of the risks of the employment as a defect in the appliances. The accident, whether due to one cause or the other, was one of the risks which might have been contemplated by a reasonable person as incidental to the employment; it occurred while Scott was doing what he might reasonably do at that time and place. Bryant v. Fissell, 86 Atl. 458. We cannot accede to the suggestion of the defendant that disobedience of a specific order to stop...