Case ID: nys_160/html/0002-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "HOWARD, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

(173 App. Div. 515)
    MANDLE v. A. STEINHARDT & BRO., Inc., et al.
    (Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department.
    June 30, 1916.)
    Master and Servant <§=5361—Workmen’s ' Compensation Act—Employé Within Statute—Hazardous Employment.
    A traveling salesman, riding in a public bus while engaged in his regular occupation,'was not engaged in a hazardous employment, and cannot recover .under the Workmen's Compensation Law (Consol. .Laws, c. 67), although his employer’s business was hazardous under section 2, groupi 32, of the act.
    Ed. Note.—For other cases, see Master and Servant, Dec. Dig. <§=> 361.]
    <@^>IPor other cases see same topic & KEY-NUMBER in all Key-Numbered Digests & Indexes
    Appeal from Award of State Industrial Commission.
    Proceeding by Herbert Mandle to recover for personal injuries under the Workmen’s Compensation Law. From an award of the State Industrial Commission, allowing compensation, A. Steinhardt & Bro., Incorporated, employer, and the Massachusetts Bonding Be Insurance Company, insurance carrier, appeal. Reversed and remanded to the commission.
    Argued before KELLOGG, P. J., and LYON, HOWARD, WOODWARD, and COCHRANE, JJ.
    Nellis Be Nellis, of Albany (Merwyn H. Nellis, of Albany, of counsel), for appellants.
    Egburt E. Woodbury, Atty. Gen. (E. C. Aiken, Asst. Atty. Gen., of counsel), for respondent.
    R. W. Donynge, of New York City, for State Industrial Commission.
   HOWARD, J.

The claimant was a traveling salesman. His employer was engaged in the manufacture of leather and other fabric novelties in New York City. The claimant occasionally visited the factory to procure samples. He was injured while riding in a public bus from White Plains to Port Chester, and was, at the time of the accident, engaged in his regular occupation of going from place to place for the purpose of selling goods.

Under group 32 of section 2 of the Workmen’s Compensation Law, the employer was engaged in a hazardous employment; but the claimant was not so engaged. The hazards incident to manufacturing leather goods in no manner menaced this claimant, riding along on the highway in a bus with other passengers. In fact, the vicissitudes of the claimant, as he journeyed from town to town, were not in the remotest degree affected by the character of the business carried on by his employer. His perils were not increased; his safety not diminished. It is not sufficient under the statute for the employer to be engaged in a hazardous employment; the claimant must have been so engaged. We have jitst recently passed upon this question in a case quite similar to this. Sickles v. Ballston Refrigerating Storage Co., 171 App. Div. 108, 156 N. Y. Supp. 864. In view of the opinion written there, it is unnecessary to make further comment here.

The award should be reversed, and the matter remitted to the commission for further consideration. All concur.