Court Opinion

ID: 9751339
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 16:21:16.004908+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:43.097589
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice
(concurring and dissenting).
I agree that the order of the Commonwealth Court should be vacated, but I see no reason to remand the case to the Board.
A claimant under the Workmen’s Compensation Act must prove that he suffered an accident and that the ac*288cident occurred in the course of his employment. Claimant has done this. There was an additional finding of fact that claimant had suffered a back injury fourteen years earlier. The Board considered this earlier injury too remote to be germane.
If the employer wished to deny liability for the accident by asserting that the injury was caused by the effects of the earlier accident, it was incumbent on it to produce evidence to support such a finding of fact. The employer has not done so. The referee and the Board had evidence of the earlier injury but made no finding of fact that it caused the present injury.
A compensable injury has been established. This conclusion has not been altered by any finding that it was caused by an earlier injury. I can see no reason to allow the employer to attempt again to prove that which he could not at the earlier opportunity.