McGinty v. Workmen's Compensation Appeals Board.

McCABE, P. J.

The facts are not complicated. Petitioner was employed as an inside salesman by Beckman Instruments, Inc. His usual working hours were from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Petitioner was required by the terms of his employment to attend an evening sales meeting once each month.

On April 22, 1965, the monthly evening sales meeting started at approximately 4:30 p.m. in the Fullerton plant of Beckman Instruments, Inc., petitioneer’s employer, and continued until 7:30 or 8 p.m. At that time the meeting adjourned to the Lamplighter Restaurant. Petitioner drove to said restaurant with sales manager Thomas A. Guerin leaving his personal car in the company parking lot. A drink and meal were served which were paid for by the employer and during which business was discussed. About 10 p.m., the sales manager several times asked petitioner if he wanted a ride with him, but petitioner refused and Mr. Guerin left. No food or drink was paid for by the employer after Mr. Guerin’s departure. Mr. Yearsley, an outside salesman in attendance at the meeting, testified he left about 11:10 p.m. and at approximately 11 p.m. some of the group moved to the piano bar and commenced singing. Mr. Starrett, another outside salesman, deposed that he left the restaurant at approximately 1:30 to 1:45 a.m., and he believed petitioner was still there.

At 3 :42 a.m., April 23, 1965, the California Highway Patrol received notice of an accident on the Newport Freeway near the Edinger off-ramp. The accident involved one vehicle only, driven by and registered to petitioner. The accident occurred approximately five miles from petitioner’s home and in the course of his normal route home from the place of his employment. Petitioner suffered severe and permanent brain damage and was unable to testify. The injury was a consequence of petitioner’s automobile striking a bridge abutment and then proceeding off the freeway.

There is no evidence as to the manner in which petitioner traveled from the restaurant to this employer’s parking lot where his car was parked.

The referee concluded, in which the board concurred, upon a petition for reconsideration that petitioner’s trip home fell

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within the “going and coming” rule and the injury was therefore noncompensable. The referee stated: “. . . certainly every employee who works overtime is not covered by workmen’s compensation in his return trip to his home. There is the further factor that the ‘sales meeting’ was for all practical purposes over when dinner was finished and the sales manager left at approximately 10:00 p.m. ... In any event he was in his own ear on the normal route home when he had a solo accident. . . .