Opinion ID: 458545
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: land-based theories of liability

Text: 7  The defendants allege that governmental third-party liability exists because the underlying plaintiffs' land-based exposure to asbestos was a result of the government's negligence in its capacity as employer and as shipyard owner. The government replies that the only ruling timely brought to this Court ... [is] the government's appeal of the district court's adverse ruling as to the vessel owner claim. The government argues that the denial of appellee's petition to bring all other issues before this court on interlocutory appeal precludes consideration of the manufacturers' claims other than that against the government qua vessel owner. 8 The government is correct that this court allowed interlocutory appeal on only the denial of the dismissal of, or alternatively, of summary judgment on, Count VI. We do not, however, read Count VI as narrowly as the government. In Count VI, defendants allege claims against the government not only in its capacity as a vessel owner but also as the owner of the shipyards ... the designer of the specifications ..., and as the general supervisor of the work performed.... Model Third-Party Complaint B, p 39. Although the district court stated that Count VI ... does not ... assert a claim against the United States in its capacity as an employer, but in its capacity as a vessel owner, we think that Count VI on its face encompasses employer and shipyard owner theories. 9 Regardless of the fact that the district court did not read Count VI as stating a claim against the government qua employer, it discussed and applied the relevant situs law that governs land-based employers as an analytical step in its disposition of the vessel owner claim. We do not think, therefore, that the district court's failure to make a separate ruling on the land-based theories of liability bars our review of them. No prejudice will result to either party and we have all the facts necessary for such a review. B 10 As the district court noted, [i]t is undisputed that the PNS employees and deceased employees in these cases were covered by the Federal Employees' Compensation Act (FECA), 5 U.S.C. Sec. 8101 et seq., and that they are barred from suing the United States as their employer by FECA's exclusive liability provision, 33 U.S.C. Sec. 8116(c). Interpreting these provisions recently, the Supreme Court held that FECA's exclusive-liability provision, 5 U.S.C. Sec. 8116(c), does not directly bar a third-party indemnity action against the United States. Lockheed Aircraft Corp. v. United States, 460 U.S. 190, 199, 103 S.Ct. 1033, 1038, 74 L.Ed.2d 911 (1983). 11 The Court added, however, that other substantive law affirmatively granting the right to proceed against the government must be identified in order to maintain such a third-party action. See id. at 197 n. 8, 199, 103 S.Ct. at 1037 n. 8, 1038; accord Prather v. Upjohn Co., 585 F.Supp. 112, 114 (N.D.Fla.1984). Consequently, we find that the district court was correct in turning initially to the substantive provisions of the Federal Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C. Secs. 1346(b), 2671-80, on which jurisdiction for Count VI is predicated, to determine whether defendants could maintain their action. C 12 The Federal Tort Claims Act is a limited waiver of sovereign immunity that subjects the United States to tort liability within certain parameters. The FTCA provides in pertinent part: 13 The United States shall be liable, respecting the provisions of this title relating to tort claims, in the same manner and to the same extent as a private individual under like circumstances, but shall not be liable for interest prior to judgment or for punitive damages. 14 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2674. The waiver extends to third-party claims against the government. United States v. Yellow Cab Co., 340 U.S. 543, 71 S.Ct. 399, 95 L.Ed. 523 (1951). And it extends to third-party claims against the government for losses incurred by third-parties as the result of injuries to federal employees covered by FECA where other applicable substantive law grants a right of recovery. Lockheed, 460 U.S. at 198, 103 S.Ct. at 1038. 15 Section 2674 is amplified by a sister provision stating that, subject to certain exceptions, federal district courts are granted subject matter jurisdiction over claims to redress injury caused by any employee of the government under circumstances where the United States, if a private person, would be liable to the claimant in accordance with the law of the place where the act or omission occurred.  28 U.S.C. Sec. 1346(b) (emphasis added). To identify the applicable rule of substantive law, the FTCA directs us to determine the substantive law that would apply to a private individual under like circumstances in the jurisdiction where the injury occurred. We therefore look to whether a private person in like circumstances would be liable under the law of Maine, the situs state. United States v. Muniz, 374 U.S. 150, 153, 83 S.Ct. 1850, 1853, 10 L.Ed.2d 805 (1963); Brooks v. A.R. & S. Enterprises, Inc., 622 F.2d 8, 10 (1st Cir.1980). 16 All parties agree with the district court that a private individual under like circumstances is a compensation-paying private shipyard employer in Maine. They differ, however, on what kind of compensation system is to be ascribed to the analogous private employer for purposes of the FTCA analysis. The defendant asbestos manufacturers contend that the analogous private employer is a private shipyard employer with a FECA-like workers' compensation system. The United States and the district court posit that an analogous private shipyard employer would be covered under the Maine Workers' Compensation Act (the Maine Act or MWCA), 39 Me.Rev.Stat.Ann. Sec. 1 et seq. (1978 & Supp.1984-85). 17 In the companion case of Drake v. Raymark Industries, Inc., 772 F.2d 1007 (1st Cir.1985), we determined that a compensation-paying private shipyard employer in Maine, Bath Iron Works, was concurrently covered by both the Maine Act and Longshore and Harborworkers' Compensation Act. We held that both Acts barred contribution and noncontractual indemnity actions, such as defendants seek to maintain here, against a compensation-paying employer. The Drake ruling governs the question here and requires that defendants' third-party claims against the government in its capacity as employer be dismissed. See id. at 1019-22. 18 Defendants argue, however, that Sec. 4 of the Maine Act bars none of their claims because that statute by its terms cannot apply to the United States. For the same reason, neither could the Longshore Act apply to the government. This latter argument, however, was not made by defendants undoubtedly because it would have negated their vessel owner negligence claim predicated on the application of the Longshore Act to the United States despite the government's exclusion from its coverage. Nevertheless, they contend that considering the United States as a private individual under like circumstances as the FTCA mandates, the proper analogy is a private employer covered by FECA and not by the Maine Act. Under such an approach, the type and provisions of the applicable workers' compensation system is one of the circumstances that must be factored into the analysis. The appropriate analogy, therefore, is a private shipyard employer covered by a workers' compensation scheme like FECA, with an exclusivity provision worded and interpreted like that of FECA. Because Lockheed held that FECA's exclusivity provision did not bar third-party actions such as this, the defendants claim that Count VI's land-based theories of liability may proceed. In their view, the Maine Act's exclusivity provision is simply inapplicable and irrelevant. 19 We find this reasoning unpersuasive. A private shipyard employer in Maine, as is Bath Iron Works, would be covered by the MWCA as well as the LHWCA, and the FTCA defines the United States' liability as that of a private individual in like circumstances. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2674. As one court has noted, 20 unless the phrase under like circumstances is read to nullify the phrase private individual and not to modify it, [the state compensation scheme] must apply to [third-party plaintiffs'] claims. It is of course possible to argue that FECA is one of the circumstances which define the liability of the United States as a shipyard employer; FECA does not, however, apply to a private individual. Applying FECA would therefore be facially inconsistent with the language of the FTCA. 21 Colombo v. Johns-Manville Corp., 601 F.Supp. 1119, 1128 (E.D.Pa.1984). Accord Roelofs v. United States, 501 F.2d 87, 92-93 (5th Cir.1974) (state workers' compensation system, including defenses available to covered employers, is the law applied to the United States under FTCA even though the government was not in actuality covered under the state compensation law); see also Stewart v. United States, 716 F.2d 755, 765 (10th Cir.1982) (same), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 105 S.Ct. 432, 83 L.Ed.2d 359 (1984). We hold that these land-based third-party claims are barred by Sec. 4 of the Maine Workers' Compensation Act and 33 U.S.C. Sec. 905(a). 22