Employment Security Board v. Spiker

Collins, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Henry Spiker, the appellee here, had been previously employed for a period of two years by the George’s Creek Coal. Company. Having been furloughed from that com- , pany in April, 1947, he filed a claim for benefits from May 3rd, 1947 to September 15, 1947, under the provisions of the Unemployment Compensation Act, Article ³⁵³ 95A, 1947 Supplement of the Code.

He received benefits at the rate of $25 each week, the total sum being $450. In October 1947 he obtained employment with the McNitt Coal Company. Subsequently an investigation was made of the unemployment payments by the Maryland Unemployment Compensation Board, hereinafter known as the Board. As a result of that investigation the Board found that the appellee had failed to disclose the fact that during the period when he received unemployment payments, he had received some earnings which he failed to disclose to the Board, but that this nondisclosure by the appellee was not due to fraudulent intent.

Acting under what it deemed to be the authority conferred by Article 95A supra, section 16(d), the Board passed an order on March 10, 1948, requiring the appellee to repay the sum of $450 which he drew as unemployment compensation. From that order of the Board the appellee, acting under the supposed authority conferred by Article 95A supra, section 6(h), “Judicial Review,” appealed to the Circuit Court for Allegany County. From an order of that Court dated February 1, 1949, reversing the order of the Board of March 10, 1948, the Board appeals here. Article 95A, section 16(d), supra, “Penalties,” provides as follows: “Any person who, by reason of the non-disclosure or misrepresentation by him or by another, of a material fact (irrespective of whether such non-disclosure or misrepresentation was known or fraudulent) has received any sum as benefits under this Article while any conditions for the receipt of benefits imposed by this Article were not fulfilled in his case, or while he was disqualified from receiving benefits, shall, in the discretion of the Board, either be liable to have such sum deducted from any future benefits payable to him