Court Opinion

ID: 9643875
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 20:42:25.328168+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:28:16.424067
License: Public Domain

KELLEHER, Justice
with whom BE VI-LACQUA, Chief Justice joins, dissenting.
The nexus that cannot be perceived by my Brother Shea, in my opinion, can be found by an examination of this court’s reference in Carvalho v. Decorative Fabrics Co., 117 R.I. 231, 366 A.2d 157 (1976), to observations made by Justice Cardozo in In re Leonbruno v. Champlain Silk Mills, 229 N.Y. 470, 472, 128 N.E. 711, 711 (1920) (a case involving an injury caused by the playful throwing of an apple), when this distinguished jurist wrote:
“The claimant was injured, not merely while he was in a factory, but because he was in a factory, in touch with associations and conditions inseparable from factory life. The risks of such associations and conditions were risks of the employment.”
Many years ago some unidentified savant once said, “A little nonsense now and then is relished by the best of men.” With this thought in mind, it should be noted that Lomba worked at Providence Gravure as a “fly boy.” Whatever flying he performed occurred in the press room where he unquestionably came in contact with other employees who were assigned to this particular facet of the printing processes carried on by the employer.
It was pointed out in Crilly v. Ballou, 353 Mich. 303, 325-26, 91 N.W.2d 493, 505 (1958), that an employer hires a human being who brings to the work place all of his human characteristics — his frailties as well as his virtues — and who, during his time at work, becomes tired, thirsty, and hungry, and who may find that his temper may grow short as the day grows long. Relief comes by way of trips to the water cooler or to the coffee machine or by way of other acts in pursuit of personal comfort or by way of some skylarking or horseplay. Such deviations, the Michigan court said, “are not departures from employment, but *191the very substance of it. They are the inevitable concomitants of the working relationship and conditions which produce the product.”
Here, Lomba’s pleasant conversation and playful reaching out for Costa’s beard were part of the give and take that goes on in the work place between fellow workers. In actuality, his actions were a manifestation of good will toward Costa and, to many who read this dissent, a response to the telephone commercial which consistently exhorts the viewers to “reach out and touch someone.” Surely “this trifling act of foolery” 1 was not such a deviation from Lom-ba’s employment responsibilities as to justify the denial of compensation.

. Ognibene v. Rochester Mfg. Co., 298 N.Y. 85, 89, 80 N.E.2d 749, 750 (1948) (Desmond, J., dissenting.)