Court Opinion

ID: 9606356
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:49:21.580383+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:01:19.899344
License: Public Domain

THOMAS, J.,
dissenting.
At the time he was injured, Smith was unquestionably engaged in Intermodal Services, Inc.’s (the Services Company’s) trade, business, or occupation. Yet, the majority concludes that Smith has the right to sue the Services Company in tort. This conclusion is contrary to the unequivocal requirements of Code § 65.1-29.
The Services Company was engaged in the trade, business, or occupation of operating “a rail-highway exchange facility.” Ante at__As part of its work, the Services Company “engaged in the loading and unloading of trailers on and off railroad cars from a ‘piggyback yard’ adjacent to railroad tracks.” Id. The Services Company was also responsible for shifting tractors around the yard to insure they were properly parked. When the piggyback yard became full, the Services Company “obtained properly licensed and insured tractors to pull trailers from the piggyback yard” to a satellite yard. Id. When Smith was injured, he was in the piggyback yard, in the process of pulling a trailer to the satellite yard. He collided with the yard tractor. As a matter of fact then, there can be no dispute that, at the time he was injured, *605Smith was engaged in the Services Company’s trade, business, or occupation.
Code § 65.1-29 provides in pertinent part as follows:
When any person (in this section . . . referred to as “owner”) undertakes to perform or execute any work which is part of his trade, business, or occupation and contracts with any other person (in this section . . . referred to as “subcontractor”) for the execution or performance by or under such subcontractor of the whole or any part of the work undertaken by such owner, the owner shall be liable to pay to any workman employed in the work any compensation under this Act which he would have been liable to pay if the workmen had been immediately employed by him.
(Emphasis added.) Applying Code § 65.1-29 directly to the facts of this case, it is plain that the General Assembly has required that when the Services Company undertook to perform part of its trade, business, or occupation by contracting with Gary Daniel Smith for Smith to perform, either by himself or through Smith’s employees, all or part of the work of the Services Company then the Services Company became liable to pay Smith, or anyone Smith employed to do the Service Company’s work, compensation under the Act just as if Smith or Smith’s employees worked directly for the Services Company. In my opinion, by the direct application of the language of Code § 65.1-29, it is plain that Smith is a statutory employee and that his exclusive remedy is under the Act.
The majority avoids this obvious conclusion by stating that the phrase “workman employed in the work” which is contained in Code § 65.1-29 refers to employees of a subcontractor but not to the subcontractor himself. By this argument, if an employee of Smith’s had been operating Smith’s truck and was injured, that employee would be covered by the Act, but if Smith himself operated his own truck and was injured, as happened here, then he would not be covered by the Act. The majority’s exclusion of the subcontractor himself from coverage under the Act ignores other language in Code § 65.1-29 which precedes the phrase focused upon by the majority.
First, the provision refers to “contracts with any other person.” Smith is certainly included in that broad language. Second, the *606provision refers to “performance by or under such contractor” of the whole or any part of the owners work. (Emphasis added.) Performance by the contractor refers to the contractor himself. Performance under the contractor refers to employees of the contractor. Third, the phrase “workman employed in the work” refers to anyone hired by the owner — which may either be a single contractor or a contractor with employees. Thus, the phrase “workman employed in the work,” when read in context, could not possibly mean, as the majority suggests, workman employed by the subcontractor.
The gravamen of the majority opinion is that if an owner hires an independent contractor to do work, then that independent contractor cannot receive worker’s compensation benefits because an independent contractor is simply not covered by the Act. The majority thus takes the position that if a person is an independent contractor no further analysis is needed.
I disagree. In my opinion, the fact that a person is an independent contractor does not end the inquiry, it begins the inquiry. Where a person is a traditional employee, he or she is protected by the Act if his or her injuries arise out of or in the course of employment. But where a person is said to be an independent contractor there is a risk that the owner may be using that label to obscure the fact that the injured party is in truth an employee. It is precisely in the case where an injured party is said to be an independent contractor that the difficult questions of coverage arise. An independent contractor not engaged in the owner’s trade, business, or occupation is not entitled to protection under the Act. But the opposite result obtains when even an independent contractor is engaged in the owner’s trade, business, or occupation.
The cases relied on by the majority are of little or no help in the present problem because most of them did not focus upon Code § 65.1-29 or its predecessor provisions. See e.g., Va. Emp. Comm. v. A.I.M. Corp., 225 Va. 338, 302 S.E.2d 534 (1983) (not a worker’s compensation case; no discussion of the worker’s compensation statute); Richmond Newspapers v. Gill, 224 Va. 92, 294 S.E.2d 840 (1982) (injured deliveryman held to be independent contractor; no mention of whether claimant was engaged in the trade, business, or occupation of the newspaper at the time of injury); Stover v. Ratliff, 221 Va. 509, 272 S.E.2d 40 (1980) (the issue was whether defendant had enough employees to fall within *607the scope of the Act; focus was upon control; no analysis of whether various persons claimed to be employees were engaged in defendant’s trade, business, or occupation); Brown v. Fox, 189 Va. 509, 54 S.E.2d 109 (1949) (claimant held not to be an independent contractor; no analysis of whether the claimant was engaged in defendant’s trade, business, or occupation); Craig v. Doyle, 179 Va. 526, 19 S.E.2d 675 (1942) (claimant held not to be an independent contractor; no consideration given to whether he was engaged in owner’s trade, business, or occupation); and Crowder v. Haymaker, 164 Va. 77, 178 S.E. 803 (1935) (claimant held to be an independent contractor; no analysis of whether claimant was engaged in defendant’s trade, business, or occupation). Not one of the foregoing cases states that an independent contractor who is engaged in the owner’s trade, business, or occupation is not entitled to coverage under the Act.
The majority relies principally upon Baker v. Nussman, 152 Va. 293, 147 S.E. 246 (1929), in support of its conclusion that § 65.1-29 provides coverage for employees of subcontractors but not for contractors themselves. Baker does reach that conclusion. But there, as here, no mention is made of the language in the statute which refers to “contracts with any other persons” and to “performance by or under such subcontractor.” In my opinion, Baker is not well reasoned and should not be followed by the majority.
In going back 59 years in time to follow Baker, the majority inexplicably ignores two recent opinions of the Court which, in my opinion, should have been followed. In Carmody v. F. W. Woolworth Co., 234 Va. 198, 361 S.E.2d 128 (1987), the claimant was an employee of Photo Corporation of America (PCA). Woolworth granted a license to PC A to operate a portrait photography department in Woolworth’s store. Carmody was assigned by PCA to run that department at Woolworth. He was injured when he slipped on a dolly and fell to the floor. He sued Woolworth’s in tort. The trial court held that he was Woolworth’s statutory employee. We affirmed. We made clear that simply because Carmody was an employee of an independent contractor did not entitle him to sue Woolworth. We said the issue was whether Carmody was engaged in Woolworth’s trade, business, or occupation at the time he was injured. Because we concluded that he was, we held that his exclusive remedy was under the Act. To the *608same effect is Henderson v. Central Telephone Co., 233 Va. 377, 355 S.E.2d 596 (1987).
Admittedly, in Carmody and Henderson, the claimants were employees of subcontractors and not the subcontractors themselves. Yet, my reading of Code § 65.1-29 convinces me that the distinction should not lead to a different result. I would hold, as the statute requires, that even though Smith was an independent contractor because, at the time he was injured, he was engaged in the Services Company’s trade, business, or occupation, he was entitled to worker’s compensation coverage from the Services Company and, therefore, could not sue the company in tort.