Sweat v. US FIDELITY & GUARANTY COMPANY
| Decision Date | 13 January 1959 |
| Docket Number | Civ. A. No. 3650. |
| Citation | 169 F. Supp. 155 |
| Parties | Mae SWEAT, Plaintiff, v. U. S. FIDELITY & GUARANTY COMPANY, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Tennessee |
Paul E. Parker, O'Neil, Jarvis, Parker & Williamson, Knoxville, Tenn., for plaintiff.
Hodges & Doughty, Knoxville, Tenn., for defendant.
Mae Sweat, plaintiff, is the widow of Otis Sweat. She instituted this suit to recover benefits under the Workmen's Compensation Law of Tennessee (T.C.A. § 50-901 et seq.) for the death of her husband. The death occurred on March 12, 1957.
Her husband was an employee of the Wright & Lopez contracting firm which is, and was, engaged in the work of relocating telephone poles for telephone companies. The work in which the contractor was engaged at the time of the death was that of relocating telephone poles in the Tazewell Pike area of Knox County, Tennessee, for the Southern Bell Telephone & Telegraph Company. Mr. Sweat was 57 years of age at the time of his death.
Insofar as his widow knew, Mr. Sweat was a person enjoying good health up until the Thursday preceding his death which took place on Tuesday. On this Thursday before his death on Tuesday he came home from work about 5:15 p. m. in physical distress caused from difficult breathing which in turn caused smothering spells. He ate his supper on that Thursday night and went to bed without leaving his home.
Fortunately he and his crew only worked one-half day the following day, which was Friday, because of weather conditions or some other condition beyond the control of the crew. Upon quitting work at noon on Friday, Mr. Sweat returned to his home and was inactive the remainder of that day and all of Saturday and the entire weekend with the exception of driving the car to the cemetery here in Knoxville where his mother-in-law was buried. He was unable to return to work on Monday because of this distressing condition in the chest which caused smothering and difficult or short breathing.
Mr. Sweat returned to work on Tuesday against the advice of his wife and at a time when he was physically unable to do so because of this smothering and irregular breathing condition. He returned to work because he was afraid that someone would take his place if he did not report to work on that day.
The fact that he returned to work because he was afraid he would lose his job if he did not show the pressure that is on the citizen in the age in which we live.
Upon returning to work on Tuesday he took his place as a member of the crew and worked in the usual manner. The members of the crew who have testified in the case were of the opinion that the work was lighter that morning than it had been on any other morning that the crew had worked. This may be so but it does not mean by any means that the work was light. The work is never light for a person who digs post holes six feet deep and shovels the dirt in when it is wet and after having shovelled the dirt into the hole tamps the dirt with a post hole tamper. Otis Sweat did work of that nature on the morning preceding his death in the early afternoon.
Mr. Sweat reported for work about seven or seven-thirty in the morning and was taken from the place here in Knoxville on Western Avenue where the crew was usually picked up a distance of 10 or 14 miles to the Tazewell Pike area where the work was to be done.
After the members of the crew assembled the derrick which was attached to the truck and which was used for the relocation of the poles, in which Otis participated, they dipped water out of two of the post holes that had been dug the day previous and left overnight. Otis participated in the dipping of water, helped shovel the wet dirt into the post holes into which the poles were placed that morning, and in addition helped fill the trench along which the poles were moved preparatory to being placed in the new location. In addition he helped tamp the dirt that was placed in these post holes.
Otis made no complaints of his condition during the entire morning that he worked. He was not a person accustomed to making complaints. He worked for practically four and a half years for Wright & Lopez, and his foreman stated that he had never heard him make a complaint during the entire period that he worked. The foreman further stated he was one of the best workers; he was not the complaining kind.
This Court is of the opinion that he worked that Tuesday morning in great distress from the shortness of breath and smothering spells that he had because of the sick heart although he did not make known his condition to any of his fellow employees.
Having worked from early morning until 12:00 o'clock...
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