132 A. 358 | Pa. | 1926
While in defendant's employ on September 5, 1924, the deceased, William Anderson, accidentally cut his left hand on a rain spout. It became infected and required medical attention for many weeks, but gradually cleared up so that on October 30th there was apparently no active infection although some swelling, a serious discharge and inability to use the hand. On November 25th, Anderson was stricken with lobar pneumonia, which caused his death four days later; thereupon this claim was presented by his widow. The referee, after hearing, made findings of facts and legal conclusions upon which he awarded compensation, which was affirmed by the workmen's compensation board and court of common pleas; thereupon the defendant insurance carrier brought this appeal.
The controlling question presented is, whether the referee's finding that Anderson's death on November 29th resulted from the injury to his hand on the fifth day of the preceding September, is supported by evidence. In our opinion it is not, and this is a question of *446
law which the courts may review: Smith v. Philadelphia
Reading C. I. Co.,
The order of the compensation board should have been reversed and the award set aside; but, Should the lower court have remitted the record for a further hearing, and should we now so order? Section 427 of the Act of June 26, 1919, P. L. 642, provides, inter alia (p. 666): "Any court before whom an appeal is pending from any action of the board may remit the record to the board for more specific findings of fact, if the findings of the board or referee are not, in its opinion, sufficient to enable it to decide the question of law raised by the appeal. . . . . . If such court [of common pleas] shall sustain the appellant's exceptions to a finding or findings of fact and reverse the action of the board founded thereon, the court shall remit the record to the board for further hearing and determination." The referee's conclusion, in effect, that Anderson's death resulted from an accident sustained in the course of his employment, appears both among his findings of facts and his legal conclusions, but, wherever it appears, it is his deduction from the facts and is a legal conclusion. What we here do is not to reverse any finding of fact made by him, but to pass upon the question as to whether his legal conclusion is supported by evidence; as above stated, that is a matter of law, and when disposed of as such the record need not be returned for further hearing: Callihan v. Montgomery, supra. So long as the findings of facts are not disturbed, it is unnecessary for the court to remit the record for a further hearing. It should, however, be done when the facts found are not sufficient for a proper decision of the legal question, or questions, raised by the appeal. We find no necessity for so doing *449 in the instant case, which seems capable of a proper solution on the record as presented. Unless there is apparently something omitted which should have been shown, the mere fact that the evidence fails to support the claim does not require a remission of the record. We have sometimes remitted the record in cases of this class for a further hearing or for a more complete finding of the facts; but in many instances have not found it necessary to do so.
The judgment is reversed and the award of the referee, as approved by the workmen's compensation board, is set aside.