The Superior Court of Justice of Cantabria (TSJC) has declared the suicide of a worker as an accident at workby ruling that there was “causality” in the decision taken to take his own life with the situation he was experiencing at his job, for which his widow and daughter will have to receive Social Security benefits.
In this way, the labor chamber of the Superior Court upholds the appeal filed by the worker’s wife against a judgment of the Labor Court number 3 of Santander, which dismissed the lawsuit filed by the wife on the understanding that there was no such relationship and attribute suicide to the personal situation of the worker with his sick father.
According to the sentence issued by the TSJC, known to EFE, the man, who was responsible for a store in a supermarket chain in the region, was denounced by a worker for Workplace Harassmentan accusation that in an internal investigation of the company it was pointed out that it could be induced by another employee.
Circumstances of the tragic outcome
In addition, it is added that in the store for which he was responsible the atmosphere was “rarefied” for union elections. In this situation, the company proposed to this worker a change of store away from his residence and that he accept the sanction for harassment of workers.
In addition, the Social Court of the TSJC highlights, in its ruling, that there is no record psychiatric disorders or previous psychic pathologies that could unlink their death with the work problem.
Therefore, it concludes that the decision it made “was closely linked and more than direct with his work and, specifically, with the situation arising from the lawsuit for workplace harassment and its consequences”.
“We understand that the labor conflict, a foreseeable filing of a criminal complaint against him and the upcoming incorporation into a new workplace outside the place of residence, three days before the suicide, affected his mood and subsequent decision to end his life.
Thus, the court finds that “the death of the worker has as its immediate cause his work” and condemns Social Security, the company and its insurer to pay widow’s and orphan’s benefits to the wife and daughter, as well as for both to receive compensation.
