Opinion ID: 1762990
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Employees' Claim Against Co-employees

Text: Here, again, no lengthy discussion is required. Whether this Court, in light of Grantham and Fireman's Fund, [2] will uphold the legislative grant of immunity to co-employees in occupational pneumoconiosis cases is characterized by co-employees' counsel as the sole novel issue presented by this appeal. While not accepting its validity, we agree as to its novelty. We hold that the trial court erred in perceiving a distinction between the classic accident situation in Grantham  and occupational disease. This erroneous perception is grounded on co-employees' counsel's two-fold, or dual aspect, approach to occupational diseases: 1) Because a true occupational disease was not redressable at common law, [3] and, because Grantham preserved only common law rights of action, co-employee immunity applicable to byssinosis is a valid exercise of the legislative policy-making prerogative; and 2) the nature of the disease, and the scope of the legal duty for its prevention, is sufficiently different in kind, as well as in degree, to demonstrate that the legislative immunity does remove, in the industrial disease context, a social evil: patently inequitable co-employee suits. A single observation is dispositive of aspect No. I: If Wilkins's proof does not rise above the true occupational disease level, all third-party defendants will be entitled to directed verdicts. Stated conversely, if Wilkins meets his burden of proving the material elements of his claim (i. e., the alleged degree of defendant's culpability proximately causing his injury), necessarily, he will have removed himself from this assumption of the risk defense. Thus, his claim falls squarely within the ambit of Grantham's protection. Appellees' counsel's second contention that occupational disease should be treated differently, constitutionally, from other industrial, or traditional tort, cases (and thus distinguishing this case from Grantham ), is grounded in the following: (1) In traditional tort cases, the danger is readily apparent to lay persons; whereas in disease cases some expertise is required to recognize the danger; (2) the hazard is localized in traditional tort cases, but in disease cases, it permeates most if not all of the workplace; (3) momentary exposure will likely result in sudden, definite and instantly disabling injuries in traditional tort cases. In disease cases prolonged exposure is required, resulting in gradual injury of uncertain onset; (4) individuals differ in the types and degrees of their reactions to disease-producing factors, unlike the similar injury to all persons caused by an open saw's coming in contact with a finger; (5) the injury is clearcut in tort cases, but in disease cases it can be extremely difficult to diagnose; (6) evaluation of the need for and means of remedial measures are within the capability of a lay person in accident cases; whereas expertise is required even to recognize the hazard much less to evaluate its remedy in the disease context; (7) traditional tort cases involve localized correction action but entire environments must be changed in disease cases; (8) the scope of a remedy for an accident is within the authority of coemployees, but for alteration of the environment, large resources would have to be committed by the owner itself. While this latter approach is more sophisticated, its treatment and disposition need be neither lengthy nor complex. Without attempting to respond to each of the eight listed distinctions, we agree, generally, with their factual content. But, at most, they merely serve to dramatize the plaintiff's awesome burden of proof in an occupational disease claim against a co-employee as opposed to a less demanding burden in a traditional industrial accident context. For example, the instant Plaintiff, indeed, does have the burden of proving that the named co-employee Defendants had a legal duty, coupled with a sufficient degree of personal expertise and adequate facilities reasonably available to render Plaintiff's work environment reasonably safe to avoid the contraction or aggravation of his resultant injuries; all of which elements of proof are to be treated by traditional tort standards. (For a general statement of these standards in a co-employee tort context, see the concurring opinions in Fireman's Fund. ) This test is prematurely applied, as here, in the motion to dismiss posture of these proceedings. AFFIRMED IN PART; REVERSED IN PART; AND REMANDED. FAULKNER, SHORES and ADAMS, JJ., concur. EMBRY, J., concurs in the result. TORBERT, C. J., and MADDOX, ALMON and BEATTY, JJ., concur in part and dissent in part.