United Wire & Supply Corp. v. Frenier
| Decision Date | 10 January 1958 |
| Docket Number | No. 2555,2555 |
| Citation | 87 R.I. 31,137 A.2d 414 |
| Parties | UNITED WIRE & SUPPLY CORPORATION v. Harold E. FRENIER. Eq. |
| Court | Rhode Island Supreme Court |
Worrell & Hodge, Lee A. Worrell, Providence, for petitioner.
William R. Goldberg, Pawtucket, for respondent.
This is a petition for review filed by an employer which also gave notice therewith under the workmen's compensation act of its intention to discontinue payment of partial compensation to the employee. The matter was heard by a single commissioner who thereafter entered a decree allowing the petitioner to suspend payment of partial compensation. This decree was appealed to the full commission which, after hearing thereon, entered a decree affirming the decree of the single commissioner. From that decree the respondent has appealed to this court.
It is not disputed that on October 13, 1951, while employed by petitioner, respondent was injured and under a preliminary agreement was thereafter paid compensation for total disability until March 3, 1952. At that time he returned to the employ of petitioner to do light work, and on May 14, 1952 the parties entered into a new agreement wherein petitioner agreed to pay to respondent compensation for partial disability based on the difference between his actual earnings for performing light work and his average weekly wage at the time of injury, which had been agreed upon as $82.32.
In a subsequent proceeding initiated by respondent, the superior court declined to adjudge petitioner in contempt on charges that it did not comply with the provisions of the agreement of May 14, 1952. An appeal was taken to this court and thereafter, at our direction, the superior court entered a decree on January 19, 1956 adjudging petitioner in contempt for failing to comply with the terms of the agreement of May 14 and permitting it to purge itself under the terms stated. See Frenier v. United Wire & Supply Corp., 83 R.I. 472, 119 A.2d 724.
When petitioner filed this petition for review it followed the rule laid down in Ottone v. Franklin Process Co., 76 R.I. 431, 437, 71 A.2d 780, and directed the petition to the order last entered, that is, the decree of January 19, 1956, wherein petitioner was adjudged in contempt, and it filed a copy of said decree with its petition. In that decree, however, specific reference is made to the agreement of May 14, 1952 and makes the terms thereof the subject matter of this review. In other words, it makes this a petition to review the terms of the agreement of May 14, 1952.
The respondent, in arguing before this court, raised for the first time the question of whether the commission had jurisdiction to hear the petition, petitioner having failed to accompany its petition with a certified copy of the agreement to be reviewed, that is, the agreement of May 14, 1952. The provisions of rule 33 of the rules and regulations of the workmen's compensation commission require that, when filed, petitions for review should be accompanied by a certified copy of the agreement to be reviewed. In our judgment it is not necessary that we pass upon the question of whether the requirements of rule 33 were satisfied by filing with this petition a certified copy of the decree of January 19, 1956. We have examined Public Laws 1954, chapter 3297, article III, sec. 3(e), which confers rule- making power upon the commission, and are of the opinion that the authority conferred is limited to matters procedural, and that the commission may not in the exercise of that power effect an enlargement or diminution of the jurisdiction conferred upon it by the legislature. It is our opinion that no question of jurisdiction was raised.
The respondent also argues here that the clerk of the commission improperly gave notice to petitioner that it could suspend compensation payments pending a hearing claimed by the employee on the question of whether he had returned to work at an average weekly wage equal to or in excess of that which he was earning at the time of his injury. The respondent claims that the provisions of art. III, sec. 12, require that the commission give such notice. The petitioner argues that respondent failed to specify such claim of error in his reasons of appeal from the decree of the single commissioner to the full commission and that, therefore, he cannot raise the question in this court for the first time.
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