Court Opinion

ID: 9537812
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:24:51.018559+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:03.461674
License: Public Domain

PHELPS, Chief Justice, and UDALL, Justice
(dissenting).
We concurred in the majority opinion authored by Justice Windes (85 Ariz. 104, 333 P.2d 277), and voted against granting petitioner’s motion for rehearing. There has been nothing which has occurred since, either at the oral arguments on rehearing, or from the new briefs filed by the parties, that has in anywise altered or changed our views in the matter. Nor do we know of any new facts brought to light that presently justify setting aside the award.
Apparently the only thing our brethren of the majority in reality agree upon in the two separate opinions, and certainly the only issue actually decided, is that the record does not support the conclusion reached by the Commission that Worthing*321ton was not in the employ of the Little Horn Mining Company at the time of his death, hence the award is now set aside. This conclusion in and of itself is not too disturbing, but what does cause us great concern are the many serious doubts as to various phases of the Workmen’s Compensation Law (not properly before us) raised in- the opinion signed by two of our brethren. Certainly they raise more questions than they answer. Specifically we mention but one matter that we had always considered was settled beyond question, and that is whether a fellow employee is immunized from suit by an injured workman who also is covered by the Workmen’s Compensation Law. The Supreme Court of Idaho, in the case of White v. Ponozzo, 77 Idaho 276, 291 P.2d 843, 845, lays down what we consider to be the correct rule, viz.:
“The defendant, Dykes, being a co-employee of the plaintiff, is also exempt from liability by the Workmen’s Compensation Law. As an employee acting within the scope of his employment, he was the agent of the employer. His acts and conduct became the acts and conduct of the employer, and the exemption from damages at law extended to the employer by the Workmen’s Compensation Law is also by that act extended to co-employees through whom the employer ' acts. Thus, the co-employee becomes merged in the employer and is not a third person, within the meaning of the compensation law, against whom a damage action may be maintained. (Citing cases.)”
This statement is supported by a wealth of authority (23 cases) from some eleven jurisdictions.
We believe that Justice Windes, with his usual sound logic, sufficiently established in the original opinion that the Commission was justified in finding from the record before it that petitioner, at the time of the accident in question, was not in the employ of the partnership mining company. Therefore we dissent from the order of the majority setting aside the award.