Court Opinion

ID: 9581983
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:21:04.216561+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:37:22.309181
License: Public Domain

Quillian, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
The administrative law judge, in the award, found as a matter of fact that the State Archives Building is "located across two streets from the building wherein the claimant had her principal office, but, of course, is state property administered by the Georgia Building Authority.” The administrative law judge further foúnd: "On March 23, 1976,the claimant sustained an injury by accident arising out of and in the course of her *444employment when, while walking by the most direct route from her assigned parking space in a state parking facility, and while on state property, she tripped and fell over a chain stretched across a driveway, and sustained multiple fractures to her left elbow. Federal Ins. Co. v. Coram, 95 Ga. App. 622, 624; U. S. Cas. Co. v. Russell, 98 Ga. App. 181.”
The Attorney General representing the Department of Human Resources and the State of Georgia urges that the award was in error on the following grounds: 1) there was no evidence to support a finding that the claimant’s employer furnished a parking space to her, 2) there was no evidence to sustain a conclusion that the accident occurred on state’s property, 3) there was no evidence that the claimant was on her employer’s premises.
The evidence showed that the claimant had not reached her employment when she was injured. She was injured when she fell in a parking facility in a separate building from where she worked. The parking facility was owned and operated by the Georgia Building Authority, not by her employer which is the Georgia Department of Human Resources. The Building Authority is a separate legal entity which can sue and be sued in its own right. The parking space was not furnished to the claimant by the state. She rented the parking space from the Authority.
The cases cited by the administrative law judge (Federal Ins. Co. v. Coram, 95 Ga. App. 622, 624 (98 SE2d 214); U. S. Cas. Co. v. Russell, 98 Ga. App. 181 (105 SE2d 378)) in his award are distinguishable because in those cases the claimant was injured while on the employer’s premises.
The claimant having received her injuries while en route to her employment was not entitled to compensation. Smith v. Travelers Ins. Co., 139 Ga. App. 45 (227 SE2d 868); American Mut. &c. Ins. Co. v. Curry, 187 Ga. 342 (200 SE 150).
I am authorized to state that Judge Webb and Judge Birdsong join in this dissent.