Saylor v. Black & Decker Manufacturing Co.

Digges, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This case involves denial of a workmen’s compensation claim by an employee who was injured on his way to work. The Workmen’s Compensation Commission determined that because the injury occurred on a parking lot access road it was not an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment. The Circuit Court for Carroll County (Weant, J.) affirmed this ruling on the ⁶⁰⁷ ground that because the employee had not yet reached the parking lot he had not arrived at the work “premises.” On July 18, 1968 the appellant James D. Saylor was being driven to work by a co-worker, Russell Groomes, one half hour before their 4:00 p.m. shift began at the Black and Decker Manufacturing Company in Hampstead, Maryland.

They entered the 374. acre fenced plant complex through its only entrance gate, just off Hanover Pike. Once they did this they were on a thirteen acre parking lot provided and maintained by the employer. The lot was designed to accommodate the 3800 employees who worked in varying shifts in the company building immediately adjoining it. An internal access road within this large lot divided it into north and south sections and circumscribed each.

Apparently no reserved spaces were permitted in this lot and parking was on a first come — first serve basis. Groomes and Saylor were going to an area of the south parking lot which made it necessary to traverse the entire width of the lot from the front gate to the opposite side and then turn left twice. Guards directed the parking of cars within each area, but they were not on the road. Groomes had made his first left turn and was proceeding along the road on the periphery of the south area.

While near the end of the road but still a short distance from where the parking guards were directing traffic, Groomes jammed on his brakes to avoid hitting a large stone in the middle of the access road. Saylor, who had been leaning over the back seat to close the rear window, was thrown forward and injured as he fell against the instrument panel. The happening of the accident and its location are undisputed, and the parties have stipulated that the only question is whether the appellant’s injury arose out of and occurred in the course of employment. Code (1957, 1964 Repl.

Vol.), Art. 101, § 15. To answer this question we are faced with the application of the “Going and Coming” rule and its exception, the “Premises” rule, which, stated together as a question, mean: Was the employee injured on his way to work, or after he had arrived on ⁶⁰⁸ the premises? In Pariser Bakery v. Koontz, 239 Md. 586, 590 , 212 A. 2d 324 (1965) Judge C. Marbury for the Court stated: “It has been held consistently by this Court that employees who suffer injuries in going to and returning from their places of work are excluded from the benefits of the Workmen’s Compensation Act. Police Com/m’r v. King, 219 Md. 127 , 148 A. 2d 562 ; Rumple v. Henry H. Meyer Co., Inc., 208 Md. 350 , 118 A. 2d 486 ; Reisinger-Siehler Co. v. Perry, 165 Md. 191 , 167 Atl. 51 .” But Judge Marbury later speaking for the Court supplemented this by pointing out in Salomon v. Springfield Hospital, 250 Md. 150 , 242 A. 2d 126 (1968) : “. . . we recognize that ordinarily an employee who has arrived on his employer’s premises as usual, in preparation for beginning his day’s work, is considered to be on the premises and therefore covered by workmen’s compensation even though his actual employment has not begun . . . .” The “on the premises” exception to the going and coming rule is echoed in Section 67 (3) of Article 101, Code (1957, 1964 Repl.

Vol. and 1969 Cum. Supp.) which defines “employee” as “a person who is engaged in an extra-hazardous employment in the service of an employer, carrying on or conducting the same upon the premises or at a plant, or in the course of his employment away from the plant of his employer . . .” (emphasis supplied). While this statutory language does not necessarily enunciate the fine distinctions implicit in the going and coming rule, it does point to a relationship which we have recognized between the work plant and the premises around the plant. 1 ⁶⁰⁹ In Proctor-Silex v. DeBrick, 253 Md. 477 , 252 A. 2d 800 (1969) Judge Smith for this Court exhaustively reviewed the Maryland cases and a number of leading cases from other jurisdictions involving the premises rule. A repetition of this analysis is not necessary here.

The principle emerging from that case is that there must be a work association between the part of the employer’s property where the employee was injured and the area in which he worked. The Proctor-Silex case recognized and applied a rule of thumb which allows compensation for injuries occurring on parking lots provided for the use of the employees, a rule followed by many other jurisdictions. 253 Md. at 482-83 , citing 1 Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law, § 15.14 (1968). The trial judge was therefore correct in observing that this Court has extended employer liability at least as far as the parking lot