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Ditto v. Stoneberger8/28/2002
. at 415 (surviving spouse deemed "wholly" dependent when her income, which she pooled with the income of her husband, was only eight percent of what her spouse earned at the time of his death). Therefore, if this were a worker's compensation case, it is clear that Mary Stoneberger and Candi Blessing would be deemed to be partially, not wholly, dependent on Edward Stoneberger.
Only a small handful of out-of-state cases, all decided prior to the Eisenhower administration, discuss "substantial dependency" in terms of wrongful death statutes. In 1952, the Superior Court of New Jersey considered whether a mother and father were dependents of their deceased eighteen-year-old daughter. Bohrman v. Pennsylvania Railroad Co., 93 A.2d 190 (1952). The father owned a beauty shop and he and his wife worked in the shop. While in high school, the daughter worked in her father's shop every afternoon after school, on Saturdays until noon, and a full six days per week during school vacations. She cleaned the shop, sterilized equipment, answered the telephone, made appointments, received payments, kept records, and assisted in servicing customers. The deceased daughter had graduated from high school in 1950 and intended to become a beauty operator. She was five weeks of training away from completing the beauty school course at the time of her death.
The pertinent statute provided: "The amount recovered in proceedings under this chapter shall be for the exclusive benefit of the widow, surviving husband, dependent children of the decedent, or the descendants of any such children, the dependent natural parents of the decedent, . . . ." Id. at 192-93. In determining the meaning of "dependent," the Superior Court of New Jersey turned to the dictionary definitions as well as other courts' interpretations of the word. Id. The court came to the conclusion that "The degree of dependence is not as important as the fact that it be more than mere reception of benefits and partake of the character of reliance upon the receipt of the care, service or favor, in whatever quantity it may be." Id. at 193 (citing Turon v. J. & L. Construction Co., 86 A.2d 192, 200 (1952)).
The court settled on a "partial dependency in a substantial degree" standard that the evidence had to meet and held that there was ample testimony indicating substantial dependence of the parents upon the services of their deceased child. Id. at 194. The court said: "Not only were [the decedent's] parents deprived of her probable earnings during her minority (which would have inured to their benefit), but they were also deprived of the reasonable expectancy of contributions of a pecuniary nature which decedent might have made after reaching her majority." Id. at 195.
A Tenth Circuit case from 1943 seems to equate partial dependence with substantial dependence. In Myers v. Pacific Greyhound Lines, the appellant instituted an action against Pacific Greyhound to recover under New Mexico's wrongful death statute for the death of her unmarried twenty-two year old brother. 134 F.2d 457 (10th Cir. 1943). For about a year-and-a-half prior to his death, the brother regularly sent his sister $20.00-$35.00 per month in cash, and prior to that, he sent her money intermittently. The deceased also purchased clothes for his sister and shortly before his death, promised that he would continue to support her. The decedent's sister was married at the time of her brother's death, but the joint income of the sister and her husband was insufficient to support them.
Because the Supreme Court of New Mexico had not dealt with the question of the degree of dependence required for recovery under the wrongful death statute, the Tenth Circuit look
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