June 1999
The Supreme Court decision in Chandris Inc. v. Latsis (June 1995) has further defined which maritime workers qualify as Jones Act Seamen.
Plaintiff Latsis was employed by Chandris through their Miami office as a superintendent engineer with responsibility for maintaining and updating the electronic and communications equipment on the Chandris fleet. This required Latsis to undertake a number of voyages aboard the various Chandris vessels. Latsis lost substantial vision in one eye during such a voyage due to what was subsequently diagnosed as a detached retina. He filed suit in Federal Court in New York claiming Jones Act status and seeking compensatory damages for the vessel’s doctor’s apparent failure to treat the condition properly.
The Supreme Court established the following two-part test to define status as a Jones Act Seaman :
"1 for employee to qualify as "seaman" under the Jones Act, employee’s duties must contribute to function of vessel or to accomplishment of it’s mission; and,
2 employee must have connection to a vessel in navigation, or to identifiable group of such vessels, that is substantial in terms of both it’s duration and nature."
The Supreme Court also noted as improper the trial judges’s instruction to the jury that when determining whether the employee performed a substantial part of his work aboard, the time spent on the vessel while in dry dock should be disregarded.
Finally, for the guidance of the lower courts, the Supreme Court cited the Fifth Circuit’s general rule that a worker who spends less than 30% of his time in the service of a vessel in navigation should not qualify as a Jones Act Seaman, and indicated that this rule would be appropriate in most circumstances.
Prior to the Chandris decision, the Supreme Court’s decision in McDermott Int’l v. Wilander (1991) (reported in "Sea Venture" Vol. 14, Page 28) established that although "it is not necessary that a seaman aid in navigation or contribute to the transportation of the vessel......a seaman must be doing the ship’s work" and added that "the key to seaman status is employment related connection to a vessel in navigation". And in the earlier case of Offshore Co. v. Robison (1959) the Supreme Court held that a seaman need only "contribute to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of its mission". Thus in Chandris the Supreme Court significantly narrowed the scope for claiming Jones Act status by introducing a more restrictive test than those used in earlier decisions.
