MABUHAY SHIPPING SERVICES,
INC. AND SKIPPERS MARITIME CO., LTD., petitioners, vs. HON. NATIONAL LABOR
RELATIONS COMMISSION (FIRST DIVISION) AND CECILIA SENTINA, respondents
G.R. No. 94167 | Jan. 21, 1991
FACTS:
Romulo Sentina was hired as a 4th
Engineer on board M/V Harmony I starting from July 13, 1987.
On January 16, 1988 at about 3 p.m., while
the vessel was docked alongside Drapetona Pier, Piraeus, Greece, Sentina
arrived aboard the ship from shore leave visibly drunk. He became violent and
started challenging his other shipmates to fight. He smashed and threw a cup
towards the head of an oiler, Emmanuel Ero, who was then eating. This
infuriated Ero which led to a fight between them. After the shipmates broke the
fight, Sentina was taken to the hospital where he passed away.
Private respondents filed a complaint for
payment of death benefits, burial expenses, unpaid salaries and overtime pay
with the POEA. The POEA ruled in favor of private respondent and ordered
Mabuhay Shipping Services, Inc. and Skippers Maritime Co., Ltd. to pay
complainant Cecilia S. Sentina death benefits and burial compensation, as well
as, unpaid shipboard pay, fixed overtime pay, and attorney’s fees. It held that
payment of death compensation benefits only requires that the seaman should die
during the term of the contract and no other. It further held that the saving
provision relied upon by petitioners refers only to suicide where the seaman
deliberately and intentionally took his own life.
A motion for reconsideration and/or appeal
was filed by petitioners with the First Division of the National Labor
Relations Commission, which dismissed the appeal and affirmed the POEA’s
Decision.
ISSUE:
Whether or not respondent is entitled to
death compensation benefit
RULING:
The mere death of the seaman during the
term of his employment does not automatically give rise to compensation. The
circumstances which led to the death as well as the provisions of the contract,
and the right and obligation of the employer and seaman must be taken into
consideration, in consonance with the due process and equal protection clauses
of the Constitution. There are limitations to the liability to pay death
benefits.
When the death of the seaman resulted from
a deliberate or wilful act on his own life, and it is directly attributable to
the seaman, such death is not compensable.
As in this case the seaman, in a state of
intoxication, ran amuck, or committed an unlawful aggression against another,
inflicting injury on the latter, so that in his own defense the latter fought
back and in the process killed the seaman, the circumstances of the death of
the seaman could be categorized as a deliberate and wilful act on his own life
directly attributable to him. The death of Sentina is attributable to his
unlawful aggression and thus is not compensable.
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