Opinion
CASE NO. 675 CRD-3-87
AUGUST 10, 1989
The claimant was represented by Lindalea Ludwick, Esq., Sklarz Early.
The respondents were represented by Kevin Maher, Esq., Maher Williams.
This Petition for Review from the December 14, 1987 Finding and Award of the Commissioner of the Eighth District acting for the Third District was heard March 31, 1989 before a Compensation Review Division panel consisting of the Commission Chairman, John Arcudi, and Commissioners Michael S. Sherman and A. Thomas White, Jr.
OPINION
In this matter the legal issue involved is whether the conclusion that claimant's injury arose out of and in the course of the employment was correct. Claimant was a police officer who had been summoned to a disciplinary hearing. The parties stipulated (TR, 10/27/87, pp 3-4) that claimant was in an employee status at the time of said hearing, April 13, 1981. His injury occurred when he fell on the steps of the Police Department building while leaving the hearing and sustained damage to his back and left knee.
The determination made by the commissioner is largely a factual one and must be accorded "the same deference as that given to similar conclusions of a trial judge or jury on the issue of proximate cause. . . . `This rule leads to the conclusion that unless the case lies clearly on the one side or the other the question whether an employee has so departed from his employment that his injury did not arise out of it is one of fact.'" Fair v. People's Savings Bank, 207 Conn. 535, 541 (1988) quoting Herbst v. Hat Corporation of America, 130 Conn. 1, 7-8 (1943).
Further Fair relied on Cardillo v. Liberty Mutual Co., 330 U.S. 469, 477-78 (1947), stating that a commissioner's conclusion would be upheld unless found without evidence. "If supported by evidence and not inconsistent with the law, the . . . [c]ommissioner's inference that an injury did or did not arise out of and in the course of employment is conclusive. No reviewing court can then set aside that inference because the opposite one is thought to be more reasonable. . . ." Fair, supra, 539-40, quoting Cardillo, supra, 477.
We, therefore, affirm the trial commissioner's Finding and Award.
Commissioners Michael S. Sherman and A. Thomas White, Jr. concur.