Wilkins v. West Point-Pepperell, Inc., POINT-PEPPEREL

• Decision Date: 10 April 1981
• Docket Number: POINT-PEPPEREL,INC
• Citation: 397 So.2d 115
• Parties: Nat WILKINS, individually and as representative of the class v. WESTet al. 79-807.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Page 115

397 So.2d 115

Nat WILKINS, individually and as representative of the class v. WEST POINT-PEPPERELL, INC. et al.

79-807.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

April 10, 1981.

Ira A. Burnim and Dennis N. Balske, Montgomery, for appellants.

Warren Lightfoot and Douglas Arant, Scott M. Phelps, and James Walker May, of Bradley, Arant, Rose & White, Birmingham, E. Mabry Rogers and William F. Horsley of Samford, Denson, Horsley, Pettey & Martin, Opelika, Bibb Allen, Birmingham, C. Powers Dorsett, Associate Gen. Counsel & Asst. Secretary, West Point, Ga., for West Point-Pepperell, Inc.

JONES, Justice.

On October 19, 1979, within one year of the last date of his employment, Nat Wilkins instituted this action against his former employer, West Point-Pepperell, Inc., and numerous co-employee defendants, seeking to recover for personal injuries associated with byssinosis. ¹ Wilkins seeks compensatory and punitive damages for "three separate and distinct injuries": 1) initial contraction of byssinosis; 2) aggravation of his condition; and 3) nondisability injuries suffered as a result of his allegedly being deceived into forgoing benefits due him under the Workmen's Compensation Act. Wilkins's claim for contraction of the disease is directed only against his co-employees, while his allegations of aggravation and "nondisability" injuries were cast against both his employer and his co-employees.

Defendants-Appellees moved to dismiss the complaint, urging the court, inter alia, to treat it as a claim for workmen's compensation benefits under the Alabama Workmen's Compensation Act. Code, § 25-5-81. The circuit court granted Defendants' motions to dismiss, leaving Wilkins the option of amending his complaint so as to state a cause of action for workmen's compensation. Instead, he instituted this appeal.

Appellant's counsel, in brief, state the "Issues Presented for Review" thusly:

"I. Whether ... plaintiff is precluded by the exclusive remedies provisions of the Workmen's Compensation Act from asserting claims at law against the co-employee defendants to this action for their fraud and other tortious conduct which proximately caused plaintiff to contract brown lung disease, to suffer an aggravation of his disease whereby he became totally disabled, and to forgo the benefits due him under the Workmen's Compensation Act?

"II. Whether plaintiff is precluded by the exclusive remedies provisions of the Workmen's Compensation Act from asserting claims at law against his employer for its tortious conduct which caused plaintiff to suffer an aggravation of his work-related disease whereby he became totally disabled?

"III. Whether plaintiff may sue his employer outside the compensation act for the nonphysical and nonwork-related injuries he suffered as a result of his employer's fraudulent scheme to mislead him into forgoing the benefits which were his due under the Workmen's Compensation Act?"

We respond to issues Nos. I and III, as posed, in the negative, and to issue No. II in the affirmative; therefore, we affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand.

Counsel summarize their client's multiple claims:

"(P)laintiff charges that he ... suffered the first of these injuries, namely, (his) initial contraction of brown lung disease, as a proximate result of defendants' (other than the employer's) fraud and other tortious acts. Plaintiff alleges that the co-employee defendants 'intentionally willfully, wantonly, and recklessly' permitted plaintiff ... to be exposed to dangerously high concentrations of cotton dust while employed at defendant West Point Pepperell's Opelika mill.... In addition, plaintiff contends, though the co-employee ... defendants to this suit were well aware that plaintiff ... might contract brown lung disease as a result of (his) continued exposure to cotton dust at the Opelika mill, they never warned plaintiff ... of this fact. Though defendants knew that ... plaintiff (was not) aware of the real health risks to which (he was) subjected at the mill, defendants, for their own purposes, preferred to keep plaintiff ... ignorant of these dangers.

"...

"Second, plaintiff's complaint alleges that the defendant employer to this suit, along with the co-employee ... defendants, proximately caused plaintiff ... to suffer aggravation of (his) work-related lung ailments and thereby to become totally disabled. This occurred when defendants, fully aware that plaintiff ... had contracted brown lung disease, caused (him) to continue laboring in the mill while (he) became sicker and sicker and eventually became disabled.

"When plaintiff ... initially contracted brown lung disease, (he) suffered a variety of debilitating symptoms, especially impaired lung functioning. However, despite (his) initial contraction of the disease, (he) still had the capacity to work. It was only when plaintiff ... continued to be exposed to the unhealthful conditions at the Opelika mill, after (he) had initially contracted brown lung disease, that (his) lung (condition) deteriorated to the point where (he was) no longer able to work.

"...

"As alleged in plaintiff's complaint, defendants intentionally withheld this information from plaintiff ... for the purpose of deceiving (him) as to the work-related nature of (his) disease. As defendants knew, by failing to inform plaintiff ... that (he was) suffering from byssinosis or brown lung, they caused plaintiff ... to be misled into thinking that (his) lung illness had not been contracted due to (his) work.

"...

"Third, plaintiff alleges in his complaint that the employer-defendant to this action, as well as the co-employee ... third party defendants, engaged in a fraudulent scheme designed to prevent plaintiff ... from taking advantage of (his) entitlements under the Workmen's Compensation Act. As a result of this scheme, plaintiff alleges he ... suffered a variety of nonphysical, or nondisability, injuries. These injuries consisted of the emotional and mental distress which plaintiff ... suffered when upon (his) involuntary termination from defendant West Point Pepperell, Inc.'s employ, (he was) forced to eke out an existence in abject poverty, supported only by the meager sums provided by the social security system."

I. Employee's Claims Against Employer

Although we are impressed with the professional skills of counsel for Plaintiff, we perceive no purpose in burdening the opinion with a lengthy discussion of this issue. We hold that the "exclusive remedy" sections of the Workmen's Compensation Act stand as an impenetrable barrier to the claims here sought to be asserted by the employee against his employer. §§ 25-5-52 and -53, and 25-5-3 and -4; see De Arman v. Ingalls Iron Works Co., Inc., 258 Ala. 205, 61 So.2d 764 (1952).

Counsel's argument, particularly with reference to Plaintiff's "nonphysical injuries," is commendably ingenious and highly persuasive; but it is in the nature of a policy argument which is more properly addressed to the legislature. However inclined we may be to accept Plaintiff's contention, we have no authority, constitutionally, statutorily, or otherwise, to judicially engraft an exception into the immunity provisions applicable to the employer. Clark v. Chrysler Corp., 342 So.2d 902 (Ala.1977); see, also, Adair v. Moretti-Harrah Marble Co., Inc., 381 So.2d 181 (Ala.1980). By the explicit terms of the Workmen's Compensation Act, a compensable injury (and, in the case of pneumoconiosis, its aggravation) has its exclusive remedy against the employer under the act and not otherwise. Breimhorst v. Beckman, 227 Minn. 409, 35 N.W.2d 719 (1949). The trial court did not err in dismissing Plaintiff's claim against West Point-Pepperell.

II. Employees' Claim Against Co-employees

Here, again, no lengthy discussion is required. Whether this Court, in light of Grantham and Fireman's Fund, ² will uphold the legislative grant of immunity to co-employees in occupational pneumoconiosis cases is characterized by co-employees' counsel as "the sole novel issue" presented by this appeal. While not accepting its validity, we agree as to its novelty. We hold that the trial court erred in perceiving a distinction between the "classic accident situation in Grantham " and occupational disease.

This erroneous perception is grounded on co-employees' counsel's two-fold, or dual aspect, approach to "occupational diseases": 1) Because a true "occupational disease" was not redressable at common law, ³ and, because Grantham preserved only common law rights of action, co-employee immunity applicable to byssinosis is a valid exercise of the legislative policy-making prerogative; and 2) the nature of the disease, and the scope of the legal duty for its prevention, is sufficiently different in kind, as well as in degree, to "demonstrate that the legislative immunity does remove, in the industrial disease context, a social evil: patently inequitable co-employee suits."

A single observation is dispositive of aspect No. I: If Wilkins's proof does not rise above the...