Hugh B. Baker

This case involved an employee's petition to hold his employer in contempt for failing to pay the maximum rate of partial incapacity workers' compensation under an approved agreement after the employee was laid off from light-duty work. The superior court denied the contempt petition, but the Rhode Island Supreme Court reversed that denial on appeal. The court held that the employer could not unilaterally determine the extent of the employee's partial incapacity or reduce payments based on its own formula projecting prior earnings, as the approved agreement required compensation at varying rates up to the statutory maximum for the duration of partial incapacity unless modified through proper procedures under the workers' compensation act. The court reasoned that only the director of labor or the court could modify the agreement, and a contempt proceeding does not permit retroactive modification; the employer therefore should have been adjudged in contempt and given an opportunity to pay the balance owed.

labor & employmentprocedure

This case involved an employee's petition for workers' compensation benefits under Rhode Island law after chemicals splashed into his left eye while he was working, allegedly causing total disability for one month. The superior court, hearing the matter de novo, entered a decree finding that the petitioner received a compensable injury in the course of employment and was incapacitated from September 29 to October 28, 1952. The employer appealed, arguing that there was no probative evidence supporting the findings on causation and the period of incapacity. The court affirmed the decree, ruling that the trial justice's findings were conclusive because they were supported by legal evidence, including testimony from the petitioner, a coworker, and a doctor, and that questions of the weight and credibility of conflicting evidence are for the trial justice rather than the appellate court.

labor & employmentprocedure

This case involves an employee's petition under the workmen's compensation act to set aside an approved compensation agreement for suspension and settlement receipt, originally on grounds of fraud or coercion and later amended to include mutual mistake of fact. The single commissioner denied the petition after finding no fraud or coercion, and the full commission affirmed that decree. The court upheld the denial on appeal, reasoning that the governing statute allows challenges to such agreements only for fraud or coercion and contains no provision for mutual mistake of fact, while a separate proviso permitting mistake applies only to correcting injury descriptions rather than nullifying an agreement entirely. The court found sufficient evidence supporting the commission's factual findings on fraud and coercion and distinguished prior precedent that did not decide the validity of mistake as a ground.

labor & employmentprocedure

This case involved a workers' compensation petition filed by Edward Gosselin, a foundry worker who became totally disabled by silicosis, an occupational disease, and later died from it. After Gosselin's death, his widow was substituted as petitioner to continue the claim under the 1950 amendment to Rhode Island's workers' compensation law for occupational diseases. The superior court granted the petition and ordered the last employer, Parker Brass Foundry, to pay disability benefits from the date of discovery until death. On appeal, the Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed, holding that under the amended statute it was sufficient to show a causal connection between the incapacitating disease and the nature of the employment, without proving the disease was contracted during the final employment, and that the widow was a proper party to prosecute the pending claim for the benefit of the estate.

labor & employmentprocedure

This case involved a defendant charged with operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of intoxicating liquor in East Providence, Rhode Island, on May 31, 1953. A jury convicted him after trial, and the trial court denied his motion for a new trial; on appeal, he challenged the conviction on grounds that police failed to properly notify him of his statutory right to an independent physician examination and that the police surgeon's exam violated his state constitutional privilege against self-incrimination. The Rhode Island Supreme Court overruled the exceptions, holding that officers substantially complied with the statute by informing the defendant of his rights multiple times before formal arrest and that he participated voluntarily without objection, so the examination evidence was admissible. The court also found the jury instructions adequately covered the elements of the offense and did not prejudice the defendant when read as a whole.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a defendant who in 1943 pleaded nolo contendere to indictments for nighttime breaking and entering with intent to commit larceny and for possessing burglar's tools; he received a deferred sentence on the first charge in 1947 under a written agreement with the attorney general while serving a prison term on the second charge, and was later sentenced in 1953 after violating the agreement's terms. The defendant moved to be discharged, arguing that the superior court lacked jurisdiction because the five-year period for imposing sentence under the 1938 deferred-sentence statute had expired. The court held that the 1945 amendment to the statute controlled, extending the period to five years from the defendant's 1948 parole date, and therefore the court retained authority to impose the eight-year sentence. The core reasoning was that a deferred sentence is a conditional privilege rather than a substantive right, so the version of the statute in effect when the deferral was granted in 1947 governed the time limit.

criminal lawprocedure

This case concerns a petition for workers' compensation benefits filed by a former stock clerk at General Electric who alleged that lifting heavy tote pans at work caused a ruptured disc in his lower back, leading to incapacity. The superior court denied the petition after finding that the petitioner failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that his condition resulted from an injury arising out of and in the course of his employment. The Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed the denial, holding that the trial justice's factual determinations on credibility and causation were supported by legal evidence, including testimony about a prior back injury from 1949 and the petitioner's inconsistent accounts, and thus were conclusive under the statute. The court noted that questions of witness credibility and the weight of evidence are for the trial court, not the appellate court, to decide.

labor & employment

This case involved a worker's petition for compensation under Rhode Island's workmen's compensation act for an injury to his left eye that occurred during employment, resulting in aphakia and loss of binocular vision. The superior court denied the petition, finding that the employee's vision was correctable to 20/20 with glasses and thus did not meet the statutory threshold for compensation. On appeal, the Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed the denial, holding that the statute did not provide compensation for loss of binocular vision where corrected vision remained above the required level, consistent with its prior ruling in Martinuzzi v. Capitol Marble & Tile Co. The court reviewed and reaffirmed its interpretation of the act, noting that a later statutory amendment would make such injuries compensable but did not apply here.

labor & employment

This case was a negligence action in which the plaintiff sought damages after his parked car was struck from behind by the defendant's vehicle on a public road at night, pushing it into another parked car. The trial justice, sitting without a jury, found the defendant negligent and liable, determining that the defendant's failure to control his car when temporarily blinded by oncoming headlights constituted negligence that proximately caused the collision. On appeal, the court upheld the decision, distinguishing the facts from a prior precedent and concluding that the trial justice had not overlooked material evidence or erred in applying the law to the specific circumstances of the case.

torts & liability

The case involved a widow seeking to have her deceased husband's estate pay the remaining balance on a joint mortgage note secured by their home, which she now owned as the surviving joint tenant. The superior court denied the request, and the Supreme Court affirmed this decision on appeal. The court reasoned that principles of equity do not allow the surviving spouse to obtain exoneration from the estate for the full mortgage debt, citing cases like Ratte v. Ratte which emphasize that each party should bear the encumbrance proportionally based on ownership interests. The court left open the question of contribution between the parties for potential future proceedings.

family lawproperty

This case involved a plaintiff bringing an action of trespass on the case in Rhode Island superior court under a 1938 statute, where the defendant specially appeared and filed four pleas in abatement challenging the court's jurisdiction. The superior court overruled the pleas, and the defendant filed a bill of exceptions to appeal that ruling to the supreme court. The supreme court granted the plaintiff's motion to dismiss the bill of exceptions as prematurely filed, holding that under General Laws 1938, chap. 542, §12, exceptions to pretrial decisions such as the denial of pleas in abatement are reviewable only after a final decision on the merits that concludes the case in superior court. The court reasoned that this statute establishes a consistent policy against piecemeal appellate review of interlocutory questions, including those involving jurisdiction, and noted that the defendant could not invoke the statute while challenging its constitutionality.

procedure

This case involved a defendant indicted for robbery who was convicted by a jury in superior court after the victim identified him as the perpetrator on January 5, 1953, in Providence; the defendant had presented an alibi defense claiming he was in New York City at the time and possessed a bus ticket supporting travel after the alleged crime. Following the guilty verdict, the defendant moved for a new trial on grounds including newly discovered evidence about the timing of the ticket's sale, supported only by an affidavit from his attorney attaching letters from bus companies. The trial justice denied the motion, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the evidence was not newly discovered because neither the defendant nor his attorney had exercised ordinary diligence to investigate the ticket details between the January arrest and the June trial. The court overruled all exceptions and remitted the case to the superior court for further proceedings.

criminal lawprocedure

This case arose in the context of a receivership proceeding for Kalamazoo Sales & Service, Inc., where the company's liability insurer sought a declaration that it had no duty to defend or indemnify the company in pending lawsuits brought by Gladys and William Bentley for property damage from a fire allegedly caused by a serviced oil and gas range. The superior court granted the insurer's petition, relieving it of those obligations, and the Bentleys appealed. The Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the insurance policy's completed operations exclusion applied because the servicing work had been finished prior to the fire, and the policy was unambiguous with no waiver or estoppel by the insurer.

torts & liabilityprocedure

This case involves neighboring landowners in Providence where the plaintiff claimed damages after the defendant excavated her lower lot, creating a steep drop along the property line that allegedly removed lateral support from the plaintiff's land and prompted him to build a retaining wall and fence. The superior court ruled for the defendant, finding the plaintiff had not proven by a preponderance of the evidence that lateral support was taken away or that the wall was necessary. On appeal the supreme court initially concluded the trial justice overlooked expert testimony from a witness employed by both parties showing the excavation created an unstable slope likely to erode or subside, but after reargument ordered a new trial on all issues.

propertytorts & liability

This is a workers' compensation case in which the employee sought relief after the superior court dismissed his petition for benefits, finding that his back injury from bending at work did not arise out of his employment. The employee petitioned the supreme court under G.L. 1938, ch. 535, §6, initially for leave to file a motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence and later to amend the request to allow an out-of-time appeal on the same ground. The court denied the petition, reasoning that workers' compensation cases follow equity procedures under which a motion for new trial is unavailable, and that the affidavits submitted did not constitute material newly discovered evidence sufficient to justify relief under the statute.

labor & employmentprocedure

The case involved a petition for a writ of certiorari challenging the North Kingstown town council's denial of a zoning ordinance amendment that would have reclassified the petitioner's property from a residence B district to a residence C district. The amendment was sought solely to permit the petitioner to apply for a special permit to operate a 100-unit mobile homes park. The court denied the petition and quashed the writ, holding that review under the applicable special enabling act (P.L. 1948, chap. 2079, sec. 9) is limited to alleged violations of sections 3, 6, and 10 of the act. Because no such violations were claimed or shown, and following the precedent in Beauregard v. Town Council of South Kingstown, the court lacked authority to review the council's legislative zoning action on the merits.

propertyprocedure

The case involved the City of Warwick seeking to enjoin the Campbell respondents from parking or storing commercial vehicles on two lots zoned for residential use under the city's 1945 zoning ordinance. Lot 49 qualified for a valid nonconforming use because the storage began before the ordinance's adoption, but lot 47 was purchased in 1949 expressly for vehicle storage after the ordinance took effect. The superior court permitted limited storage on lot 47, but the supreme court modified the decree on appeal to prohibit any such storage there. The court reasoned that the storage on lot 47 was not an accessory use to any principal building or authorized use under the ordinance, and the 1952 amendment expressly barred parking commercial vehicles over two tons or similar trailers in residence B districts without satisfying the accessory-use conditions.

business & regulatoryproperty

This case was a divorce petition filed on grounds of extreme cruelty, with the superior court granting the petition after hearing conflicting testimony about physical assaults, threats, and the wife's nervous condition. The husband appealed, arguing insufficient evidence, condonation through resumed relations, and recrimination based on the wife's alleged misconduct. The supreme court upheld the decision, overruling the exception because the trial justice properly assessed witness credibility, found the cruelty charge supported, rejected condonation and recrimination claims, and the findings were not clearly wrong under settled law requiring deference to the trial court on conflicting evidence unless clearly erroneous.

family law

This case involves an indictment against Clare M. Colvin for entering a dwelling house at night with intent to commit larceny, where she was convicted by a jury as a principal offender after her codefendant pleaded nolo contendere. The trial court denied her motion for a new trial, and on appeal she challenged the denial of a directed verdict of acquittal and the new trial motion, arguing the evidence showed at most accessory liability rather than principal conduct. The court held that the evidence, including Colvin's voluntary signed statement detailing her involvement in planning and the crime, along with other testimony and recovered items, was sufficient for a jury to find her guilty as a principal beyond a reasonable doubt. It further determined that the trial justice had properly evaluated the motion for a new trial under the correct legal standards without overlooking evidence, and thus overruled the exceptions and remitted the case for further proceedings.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved a civil action for trespass and assault in which the plaintiff alleged that the defendant struck her with a stick and pulled her hair during an incident at a greenhouse in 1951. A jury awarded the plaintiff $2,500 in damages, which the trial justice reduced to $1,500 via remittitur, but the defendant appealed, challenging the admission of police complaint and arrest reports as exhibits and seeking an unconditional new trial. The court held that any error in admitting the reports was harmless given the overwhelming independent evidence of the assault, including witness accounts and the defendant's failed alibi, and overruled those exceptions. However, it sustained the defendant's exception on damages, ruling that even the reduced $1,500 award remained excessive in light of the plaintiff's non-permanent injuries, lack of lost wages, and subjective complaints, and ordered a further remittitur to $1,000. The case was remitted to the superior court for a new trial unless the plaintiff accepted the reduced amount.

torts & liabilityprocedure