39 A.2d 892 | Conn. | 1944
Lead Opinion
This is an appeal from a decision of the Superior Court dismissing an appeal by the defendants from an award of workmen's compensation to the plaintiff. The material facts decisive of the issues before us, with certain minor corrections to which the defendants are entitled, are these: The plaintiff was employed as a general maid in the defendant sanitarium. It maintained a cottage on its property for the housing and sleeping accommodations of its employees. It hired only such maids as would live on the premises. The plaintiff's hours of actual employment were from about 6:30 in the morning until 5:15 p.m. or later, but never later than 7 p.m. After the plaintiff had completed her work, her time was her own and she was at liberty to come and go as she pleased. On March 1, 1943, having finished her work for the day, she left the premises to visit her sister's home in a neighboring town. She had no work to do until 6:30 the next morning. On returning, she and her companion stopped in a restaurant for some refreshment, and then walked to and entered the grounds of the sanitarium. While walking along a path which led to the cottage maintained for its employees, she stepped on a *336 clinker, fell and received the injuries for which she claimed compensation.
In Harivel v. Hall-Thompson Co.,
In Guiliano v. O'Connell's Sons,
The opinion in the Guiliano case very clearly distinguishes between a situation where an employer merely extends to an employee the privilege of living in quarters the former furnishes and the employee has a free choice whether he will do so or not and one where the contract of hiring requires the employee to live upon the employers' premises. This distinction is applied or noted in Larson v. Industrial Accident Commission,
The injury to the plaintiff resulting from her stepping upon the clinker while she was following the path to the cottage arose out of her employment; Lovallo v. American Brass Co.,
The following cases from other jurisdictions support our conclusion that the commissioner was right in awarding compensation to the plaintiff and that the trial court acted correctly in dismissing the appeal: Underhill v. Keener,
There is no error.
Dissenting Opinion
I have no quarrel with the cases cited in the last paragraph of the opinion. In all of them the injuries were suffered in the building in which the employee was required to live. I also assume that the plaintiff was in the course of her employment because that was continuous. I am unable to see, however, that the injury arose out of her employment. As was said in a somewhat similar New York case: "The claimant's trip to New York was taken exclusively to satisfy his own needs and desires. His return to the premises of his employer was part of that trip. When he arrived upon the premises of his employer no duty of his employment attached." De Muth v. Butler,