Court Opinion

ID: 9846519
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:43:00.024234+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:36.753043
License: Public Domain

Justice Copeland
dissenting.
When an employee is injured while going to or from his place of work and is upon premises owned or controlled by his employer, then the injury is generally deemed to have arisen out of and in the course of the employment. Bass v. Mecklenburg County, 258 N.C. 226, 128 S.E. 2d 570 (1962). Here, Food World does not own or lease the loading zone in front of its store. The issue is whether it exercises such control over the area as to come within the rule set forth in Bass by Justice R. Hunt Parker (later Chief Justice).
*335Control means:
“Power or authority to manage, direct, superintend, restrict, regulate, govern, administer, or oversee.” Black’s Law Dictionary, p. 298 (5th ed. 1979).
Control does not necessarily mean exclusive control. Two or more persons or businesses may exercise varying degrees of control over the same activities or areas.
The Industrial Commission in its findings of fact, which are supported by the evidence, relied upon the following factors to conclude that this accident arose out of and in the course of plaintiff’s employment:
“5. . . . Delivery trucks [park] . . . there when unloading supplies delivered to defendant employer. The bag boys employed by defendant employer placed groceries in customers’ cars in the loading zone.
6. Mr. James Hill, manager of the store, notified employees where they should park while at work away from directly in front of the store in order that the customers could use the space directly in front of the store.”
Defendant employer obviously does not have exclusive control over the loading zone since the area is also used by the stores on either side of Food World and since it neither leases nor owns the area. However, it is equally obvious that it exercises some control over this area since it is interested primarily in keeping the zone open to get its purchases moved into the store and its sales moved out of the store.
The majority states that,
“[w]hile the evidence here indicates that defendant Food World instructed its employees not to park in the loading zone, and that occasionally it asked customers to move their cars from the zone, we do not think such evidence arises to that level of control which is necessary to support a determination that this loading zone was a part of defendant Food World’s premises.”
I disagree for two reasons.
*336First, the test is whether there is evidence to support the Commission’s findings and whether the findings support its conclusions. Byers v. Highway Commission, 275 N.C. 229, 166 S.E. 2d 649 (1969). We are bound by the Commission’s findings when there is competent evidence to support them. Watkins v. City of Wilmington, 290 N.C. 276, 225 S.E. 2d 577 (1976).
Since this is the scope of our review, I believe that the Commission, on the evidence regarding control in this case, reached the correct conclusion under the test as set forth in Bass. The majority in effect concedes that the defendant does exercise some degree of control over the loading zone. In my view, that degree of control is sufficient in order to apply the decision in Bass and say that the accident is deemed to arise out of and in the course of the employment. This is the conclusion in fact reached by the Commission which is supported by the findings which are in turn supported by competent evidence. Therefore, under Byers and Watkins, this Court should be bound.
Second, as Justice (now Chief Justice) Branch stated in Stevenson v. City of Durham, 281 N.C. 300, 303, 188 S.E. 2d 281, 282 (1972):
“Equally well recognized is the rule that the Workmen’s Compensation Act should be liberally construed so that the benefits under the Act will not be denied by narrow, technical or strict interpretation.”
This reasoning should apply equally to any construction of the term “control” as used in Bass. Therefore, I respectfully dissent.
Justice CARLTON joins in this dissent.