Court Opinion

ID: 9448452
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 23:36:35.167135+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:31:26.463990
License: Public Domain

RIVES, Circuit Judge
(concurring specially) .
With much of the reasoning of libel-ant-appellant I would agree. Mitchell v. Trawler Racer, Inc., 1960, 362 U.S. 539, 80 S.Ct. 926, 4 L.Ed.2d 941, removes any doubt that the shipowner’s duty to provide a seaworthy vessel is “absolute,” that is, a kind of liability without fault, and that the duty applies to an unseaworthy condition which may be only temporary. See also our last opinion in Morales v. City of Galveston, 1961, 5 Cir., 291 F.2d 97, 99, from which the Supreme Court has granted certiorari, 368 U.S. 816, 82 S.Ct. 104, 7 L.Ed.2d 23, but has not yet decided the case on its merits. It is no barrier to recovery, therefore, that Holmes’ mental illness came on suddenly and without warning to the shipowner or to himself.
Boudoin v. Lykes Bros. S. S. Co., 1955, 348 U.S. 336, 75 S.Ct. 382, 99 L.Ed. 354, makes clear that the warranty of seaworthiness extends to the crew as well as to the ship and its gear. If a mentally ill shipmate had amputated Holmes’ hand, or if Holmes, while suffering a mental and emotional breakdown, had inflicted injury on a shipmate, it seems to me that the personal injuries would be sustained as the proximate result of the unseaworthiness of the vessel and the shipowner would be liable.
Why should the result be different when the victim of the unseaworthiness produced by Holmes’ schizophrenia chances to be Holmes himself rather than some other member of the crew? Surely not, as suggested by the majority, be*481cause of some public policy expressed by Congress in excluding liability for compensation to an employee whose injury is caused by his own willful misconduct, for as this Court has held, suicide resulting from insanity is not willful so as to be within the statutory exception from compensability. Voris v. Texas Employers Ins. Ass’n., 5 Cir., 1951, 190 F.2d 929.
Nor is the absence of precedent so significant when we consider that, “until the mid 1940’s the seaman’s right to recover damages for injuries caused by unseaworthiness of the ship was an obscure and relatively little used remedy.” Gilmore & Black, The Law of Admiralty, p. 315, § 6-38.
More plausible might be the differing difficulties in proof that the injuries proximately result from employment on the ship, when the injuries are suffered by the deranged seaman himself and when they are suffered by a shipmate. If that were the true distinction, then Holmes might be able to recover if he could show that unusual hardships of life at sea or in foreign lands were the cause of his mental and emotional breakdown. That would be, of course, a question of fact to be determined after a trial on the merits. I do not believe that the door should be opened even to that extent.
A holding that a seaman’s own deficiencies rendering his ship unseaworthy would entitle the seaman to recover damages for injuries caused by such unseaworthiness would give rise to extremely far-reaching results. Under such a holding, recovery of damages might be had on behalf of the victim of his own physical illness; for example, poor eyesight, a heart condition, or tuberculosis of such character as to render the ship unseaworthy. The survivors of a seaman who committed suicide might be entitled to recover on the theory of unseaworthiness of the vessel. A seaman injured in a -brawl with another brought on by the 'seaman’s own wicked disposition or savage and vicious nature might be entitled to recover because the concept of unseaworthiness exists independently of any fault. A holding that would give rise to such results can hardly be in the public interest. When the uncertainties and difficulties of proof are considered, it would seem to be a wiser rule to impose upon the seaman the risk of injuries caused by himself or by his own deficiencies.
Some useful analogy may be drawn from cases where a ship has become unseaworthy due to the fault of a stevedoring company. In such cases the Supreme Court has held that the stevedoring company is liable to indemnify the ship upon the theory that the ship’s damages were sustained as a result of the stevedoring company’s breach of its implied warranty of workmanlike service. Ryan Stevedoring Co. v. Pan-Atlantic S. S. Corporation, 1956, 350 U.S. 124, 76 S.Ct. 232, 100 L.Ed. 133; Weyerhaeuser S. S. Co. v. Nacirema Co., 1958, 355 U.S. 563, 78 S.Ct. 438, 2 L.Ed.2d 491; Crumady v. The Joachim Hendrik Fisser, 1959, 358 U.S. 423, 428, 79 S.Ct. 445, 3 L.Ed.2d 413. So in the present case, I would think that the seaman warranted his own fitness at the time he joined the ship, and further agreed to perform his duties in a workmanlike manner. Through no fault of either the seaman or the ship, it became impossible for the seaman to perform his contract. Such impossibility, though it rendered the ship unseaworthy, should not make the ship liable to the seaman himself.
Whatever the theory, it seems to me that a seaman should not be allowed to recover damages for injuries caused by unseaworthiness when the deficiencies of the seaman himself produce the unseaworthiness. If liability of the shipowner for such unseaworthiness is to be so extended, that should be done by the Supreme Court. Thus far it seems to me that the extent of liability of the shipowner to the seaman himself in such cases is for maintenance and cure. The original libel asserting a claim for maintenance is still pending in the district court.
For the foregoing reasons, I concur specially.