Yaroch, Matter of, C-2686

• Decision Date: 10 September 1982
• Docket Number: No. C-2686,No. 13724,C-2686,13724
• Citation: 333 N.W.2d 448
• Parties: In the Matter of the Appeal and Hearing from the Final Decision of the South Dakota Department of Labor, Unemployment Insurance Division, for Edward YAROCH, Appeal . Considered on Briefs
• Court: South Dakota Supreme Court

Page 448

333 N.W.2d 448

In the Matter of the Appeal and Hearing from the Final Decision of the South Dakota Department of Labor Unemployment Insurance Division, for Edward YAROCH, Appeal No C-2686.

No. 13724.

Supreme Court of South Dakota.

Considered on Briefs Sept. 10, 1982.

Decided May 4, 1983.

Joseph G. Rimlinger, East River Legal Services, Sioux Falls, for appellant, Edward Yaroch.

Julie M. Johnson, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Aberdeen, for appellee, South Dakota Dept. of Labor.

MORGAN, Justice.

Appellant (employee) filed a claim of unemployment compensation benefits which claim was contested by his former employer The Austad Company (employer), a sporting goods supplier. After a hearing, employee was awarded benefits by the hearing examiner for the Department of Labor (Department). However, pursuant to SDCL 61-7-12, the Secretary of Labor (Secretary) made additional findings on one issue not relevant to our decision here and entered conclusions diametrically opposed to the hearing examiner on all other issues and denied the employee benefits. ¹ Employee appealed to the circuit court and now appeals from the decision of the circuit court, which affirmed the Secretary's denial of benefits. On the issue that this court decides, we hold the decision of the Secretary was not affected by any error of law and affirm the circuit court.

Employee was employed full time as a box packer and maintenance worker with employer on August 25, 1980. Employee had previously worked twelve weeks as a part-time employee. Employee was terminated February 25, 1981. ² The employer complained that employee took too long to complete several assigned tasks such as shoveling snow, trimming bushes, chopping weeds, and changing lightbulbs. Some of these jobs never were completed. On appeal, employee contends that certain findings entered by the Secretary were clearly erroneous and that the Secretary committed error in the conclusions of law that were entered contrary to the hearing examiner's decision.

The Secretary's decision concluded that employee was guilty of misconduct and should be disqualified from receiving unemployment insurance benefits. This is a conclusion of law arrived at by applying a rule of law. Hartpence v. Youth Forestry Camp, 325 N.W.2d 292 (S.D.1982). Because we have never before examined the meaning of the term "misconduct" used in SDCL 61-6-14, ³ we must first determine the correct rule to be applied in deciding whether misconduct occurred. In a leading case the Supreme Court of Wisconsin said,

[M]isconduct [within the meaning of the unemployment compensation statutes] is limited to conduct evincing such wilful or wanton disregard of an employer's interests as is found in deliberate violations or disregard of standards of behavior which the employer has the right to expect of his employee, or in carelessness or negligence of such degree or recurrence as to manifest equal culpability, wrongful intent or evil design, or to show an intentional and substantial disregard of the employer's interests or of the employee's duties and obligations to his employer. On the other hand mere inefficiency, unsatisfactory conduct, failure in good performance as the result of inability or incapacity, inadvertencies or ordinary negligence in isolated instances, or good faith errors in judgment or discretion are not to be deemed 'misconduct' within the meaning of the statute.

Boynton Cab Co. v. Neubeck, 237 Wis. 249, 296 N.W. 636, 640 (1941); see also, Detroit Gravure Corp. v. Michigan Emp. Security Comm'n., 366 Mich. 530, 115 N.W.2d 368 (1962); Heilman v. United Dressed Beef Co., 273 N.W.2d 628 (Minn.1978); Annot.; 26 A.L.R.3d 1356 (1969); 76 Am.Jur.2d Unemployment Compensation Sec. 52 (1975). This is generally the definition that the Department of Labor has used and we now adopt it.

The hearing examiner's findings detailed employee's alleged failures to perform satisfactory work. Though employee testified that his immediate supervisor had given approximately six "harsh ... full force commands ... to pick up the work," he complained he had "no idea" that his poor work could result in his termination. The hearing examiner found that the supervisor had advised employee to speed up his work....