280 A.D. 634 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1952
Claimant suffered compensable injuries which arose out of and in the course of his employment by appellant at a time when he was sixteen years of age. The appeal tenders only the issue as to the propriety and legality of the increased compensation which has been awarded to him under section 14-a of the Workmen’s Compensation Law upon the ground that at the time of the accident he “was illegally employed in violation of Section 131 and Section 132 of the Labor Law.” The facts which present the issue are not in dispute. Claimant had duly and lawfully obtained a valid “ standard employment certificate ” which authorized his employment by the appellant in the work wherein he was injured and this he delivered to its clerk who, in the vacation absence of the one customarily in charge of such matters, was then charged with the duty of receiving and further attending to it at the office where claimant was to be employed. This was in the forenoon of Monday, June 27, 1949, the day claimant began work. His accident occurred on the following Friday, July 1st. After delivering the certificate to appellant’s clerk, she looked at it and then handed it back to claimant with instructions to go to the floor above for a physical examination. She did not require him to re-sign it in her presence, and it was not returned to appellant’s office, but from there on it continued in claimant’s possession to the time of his accident four days later, during which time no notice
Basically the infant claimant’s right to the increased compensation is grounded upon a violation of his statutorily prohibited employment per se and not upon an omission of a compliance with the statutory requirements in the regulatory procedures designed to enforce the prohibition. Here, the claim is not based upon such a fundamental ground, for the employment itself had been duly authorized. Instead, it is founded upon an omission to comply with the statute’s aforesaid procedural requirements which are designed for the enforcement of the underlying public purposes of the enactment (Labor Law, art. 4) and the achievement of its objective. The requirement that the employer alone and no insurance carrier shall be liable for the increased compensation seems indicative that the minor’s entitlement to it is primarily based upon his being employed in violation of the general object and purpose sought by the exercise of the police power in the enactment of said statute.
We do not minimize the importance of the procedural requirements here involved. A reasonably punctilious compliance with them is essential to the enforcement of the statute. Neither are we unmindful of the determinations that the doubled award is to compensate for the injuries and not to penalize the employer for a violation of the law, that the right thereto is absolute when within the letter and spirit of the provisions therefor, and that it is given regardless of the equities of the case or any question of wrongdoing. (Matter of Sackolwitz v. Hamburg & Co., 295 N. Y. 264; Matter of Baumgardner v. East Coast Valve & Fitting Co., 275 App. Div. 879; Matter of Braiter v. Addie Co., 282 N. Y. 326; Matter of Miller v. Saratoga Onega Bottling Co., 271 App. Div. 941.)
Decision and award, insofar as appealed from, should be reversed, with costs against the Workmen’s Compensation Board.
Foster, P. J., Bergan and Coon, JJ., concur; Hefeernan, J., taking no part.
Decision and award, insofar as appealed from, reversed on the law, with costs against the Workmen’s Compensation Board.