Dickson Construction & Repair Co. v. Beasley

⁵⁷¹ Bonjj, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Tlie claimant, while at work cutting away a concrete structure near Hagerstown, on June 18th, or 21st, 1922, was struck on his arm and his forehead by a flying uieceuofhihe' concrete. At the time, there seemed to be only a superficial injury, and, apparently it would have caused little or no disability had the workman not been infected with syphilis. In a short while, an abscess with other diseased conditions in the head, about the point of contact, appeared, and his condition became such that he was disabled from working.

On August 17th, 1922, he filed a claim for compensation; and compensation was awarded and paid from the State Accident Fund up to September 17th, 1922, when payments were stopped on the report of the physician for the fund that the man’s condition liad yielded to treatment so that he could work. In the following Hay, upon a claim of further disability, the fund paid the claimant a lump sum of money equal to the total amount of weekly payments up to May 9th, 1923. Upon application for further payments, and after a hearing, the Commission ordered, first, that payments should have stopped as of September 17, 1922, but, upon learning that payment had been made later for the full time up to May 9, 1923, the allowance was extended to cover that payment and ordered stopped from that time on. The claimant appealed to the Baltimore City Court and prayed a jury^ trial on the facts, and, by the jury’s answer to an issue submitted on that point, was found to be suffering, since May, 1923, the time of the last payment, from disability resulting from his accident and injury of June, 1922.

The employer and insurer have prosecuted this appeal from the judgment in favor of the claimant entered upon that verdict. At the opening of the trial below the employer and the insurer moved that the appeal be dismissed because of failure of the claimant <o file his. claim for compensation within thirty days after the beginning of his disability. Section 39 of the Workmen’s Compensation Act provides that failure to file within that time shall be a bar to any claim under ⁵⁷² the act, “unless excused by 'the Commission either on the ground that the insurance carrier or the employer has not been prejudiced thereby, or for some other sufficient reason.” The claimant in the present case did not file his claim until about sixty days after the beginning of his disability, thirty days late, and there is no record of acceptance of an excuse by the Commission, or of any consideration at all by it of the delay. But notwithstanding the delay, compensation was awarded and paid for nearly a year’s disability, and the bar of the statute is invoked for the first time on an application for a mere continuation of compensation, on a claim already allowed and paid.

In our opinion, the litigation has passed the stage at which this bar of the statute may be considered. As we interpret the statute, delay in filing the claim is a fact to be considered on the question of allowance of claim in the first instance, the allowance of any claim on the particular injury, that it is relevant only to the controversy at that stage, and should be litigated then if at all. To take up such a vital objection to the claim after it has once been received and allowed, beyond any possibility of reversal, would be a violation of the principle which lies at the base of the rule res judicata (Oursler v. B. &, O. R. R., 60 Md. 358 -367 to 368); and would seem also to be opposed to the further provision of the statute, section 43, for increase or renewal of compensation under conditions subsequently arising without reference to any defect in the preliminary proceedings. We therefore conclude that the motion to dismiss the appeal was properly refused.

Before testimony was taken at the trial the court granted a motion of the employer and insurer, the defendants, to submit these three issues for the consideration of the jury : 1. Is the disability of Nelson Beasley the result of an injury received by him in June, 1922, in the course of his employment by the Dickson Construction and Repair Company % 2. Is the disease or infection with which Nelson Beasley is now suffering, the natural result of an injury received by ⁵⁷³ 'him in June, 1922, in tbe course of bis employment by tbe Dickson Construction & Repair Company? 3. Is tbe disability of Nelson Beasley subsequent to May 13, 1923, tbe result of an injury received by him in June, 1922, while in tbe employ of tbe Dickson Construction and Repair Company?

But after tbe testimony was concluded and tbe prayers for instructions submitted, tbe court struck out tbe first and sec-^ •ond issues; and we are required to review that action by tbe appellants’ first exception. Our opinion is that the third! issue sufficiently defined the ultimate question of fact to be \ •decided by tbe jury, and that instead of excluding any of the contentions of tbe defendants it comprehensively covered j¡ them all. EsneorallvnEben it Ja read in connection with the, instructions, with which it wasjsujgnitleiL-ta, the j uxy, does it seem to us clear that it did not restrict the defendants unfairly. Tbe claimant was demanding compensation for further disability from the one alleged injury of June, 1922.

The defenses urged to its allowance were: that there never had been an injury of any importance by a blow on tbe bead; that even if the jury should find such an injury, then the later disability, as well as the original disability, was the natural, proximate result of an old infection rather than of the injury; that even if the earlier disability, up to May, 1923, were due to the supposed injury rather than to thet infection, the recurrence or continuation of the disabilityJbe-t yond May, J.923, was due to tbe claimant’s refusal of treat- ¡ ment, and this refusal of treatment is to be taken as the| cause; that, still supposing tbe earlier disability, up to May, 1923, to have been dne to tbe injury, further disability was beyond tbe duration of any natural results of the injury itself and was prolonged and carried further only by tbe infection, and because of that fact was the natural result of the infection rather than of the injury. The question: Is the disability subsequent to May 13, 1923, the result of an injury received in June, 1922 ? 'admits of every one of these ⁵⁷⁴ defenses, and, as has been said, they were all submitted by the instructions of the court. That being true, there wa§ no error in striking out the additional questions. But, further than this, the first and 'third issues offered differ only in that the first speaks merely of “the disability” and the third speaks of “the disability subsequent to- May 13, 1923,” and we do not see that the difference is one of .any consequence to the defense.

That portion of the disability subsequent to-May, 1923, was the direct subject of the jury’s investigation, and the insertion of the date does not exclude from consideration any facts relevant of that inquiry. And, again, the second issue, which begins, “Is the disease or infection with which Nelson Beasley is now suffering the natural result of' an injury,” is objectionable because it fails of its purpose of' instructing the jury on the application of the rule regarding causation .in a complex situation. Indeed, it would rather mislead the jury. The disease or infection here had, obviously, an independent origin, and the question in dispute is whether it may have been started up or aggravated so as to disable the man.

To put to the jury a question merely whether the disease or infection was the result of the injury misses the real question to be decided, according to the ordinary meaning of the words. This issue is framed from the words of the statute^ section 63, which define “injury” to-include “such disease or infection as may naturally result therefrom.” But the real question is too- complex to be put before the jury by that formula. Beale, Proximate Consequences of An Act, 33 Harvard Law Review, 640. And, in addition, it may be questioned whether this latter part of the definition of injury has reference to disabilities from pre-existing disease or infection rendered disabling by the injury, as distinguished from disease or infection which originates from the injury.

For the reason stated, we repeat, we see no error in the action of the court which is the subject of the first exception. At the conclusion of the testimony the defendants submitted three prayers, that the jury be instructed to answer ⁵⁷⁵ “no” to each of the three issues originally allowed, but as two of these were afterwards stricken out, and properly stricken out, as we have held, the third prayer, on the remaining third issue, is the only one of these three prayers to be considered. This was argued on two theories: First, that the evidence showed the injury to have 'been in itself slight, and such as would not naturally disable the claimant during the extended period for which he now claims compensation ; and, second, that the uncontradicted evidence showed that Beasley’s failure to take treatment was alone the -responsible cause of the later disability. The first theory brings up the question of causal connection of one of two causes or conditions which have contributed to bring about the result inquired into.

It is familiar law that, except in suits for breach of contract, in which the court and parties are concerned only with results contemplated by the parties or, so to speak, contracted for by them, all conditions which naturally and proximately result from a cause whether contemplated or not, are,