Court Opinion

ID: 9577112
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:31:52.314484+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:19:59.620672
License: Public Domain

SPENCE, J.-
I dissent.
The uncontradieted evidence, as stated in the majority opinion, shows that the injured employee, while walking down an aisle on his employer’s premises, “had an idiopathic seiz*681ure not connected with his employment, which caused him to fall to the concrete floor and strike his head thereon, causing the injuries to his head for which compensation was awarded.” 1 am of the opinion that the record is wholly devoid of any evidence to sustain the essential finding that such injury was one “arising out of . . . the employment” (Lab. Code, § 3600) ; and that therefore the award must be annulled.
The decisions of this court clearly demonstrate that a liberal construction has been placed upon the phrases “in the course of the employment” and “arising out of the employment” in line with the statutory direction. (Lab. Code, § 3202.) But there comes a point where so-called liberal construction, if carried beyond permissible limits, can result in nullification of express statutory requirements; and in my view, such point has been reached in the majority opinion. It is clear that the statutory phrases “in the course of the employment” and “arising out of the employment” were not intended to be identical in meaning; but the result of the majority opinion is to make compensable every injury arising out of an idiopathic seizure, provided only that it occurs “in the course of the employment.” Hence the requirement that the injury must also be one “arising out of the employment ” is in effect eliminated from the statute.
It is true that the courts have encountered difficulty in construing that phrase, but the courts of this state have not heretofore gone so far as to render it meaningless. In many of the “fall” cases mentioned in the majority opinion, the cause of the fall was unknown. In some, the employee fell from equipment furnished by the employer. In others, the employee fell onto or against the equipment of the employer or into an opening or other hazard encountered at the place where the employee was performing his work. The reasoning of some of the cases, like that in the majority opinion, is not entirely clear. But in every well considered case in which an injury resulting from a fall has been held compensable as arising out of the employment, the evidence was such that it might reasonably be inferred either (1) that the fall resulted, at least in part, from some activity connected with the employment or (2) that the ensuing injury resulted, at least in part, from some peculiar condition or hazard which the employee encountered as an incident to this employment. In the absence of any evidence from which one or the other of these two inferences can be drawn, there can be no basis for a *682finding that the injury was one “arising out of the employment.”
In the present case the uncontradicted evidence shows that the fall resulted solely from an idiopathic seizure which was in no way connected with the employment; and that the ensuing injury resulted solely from striking the floor. It is therefore clear that neither of the above inferences may be drawn. The mere existence of an ordinary floor, which has no relation to the injury other than to furnish the landing place for an employee who suffers an “idiopathic seizure not connected with his employment,” cannot fairly be said to constitute a peculiar condition or hazard incident to the employment so as to meet the above-mentioned requirements.
If as a matter of policy, every injury sustained in the course of the employment is to be made compensable, the Legislature rather than the courts should make that determination. But as long as the statute expressly makes the additional requirement that the injury be one “arising out of the employment,” the courts should not, under the guise of liberal construction, ignore the statutory mandate.
I would therefore annul the award.
Edmonds, J., and Schauer, J., concurred.
Petitioner’s application for a rehearing was denied December 10, 1953.
Edmonds, J., Schauer, J., and Spence, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.