Attorney’s Knowledge of Work-Relatedness Imputed to TN Claimant, Barring Claim as Untimely Filed

In an unpublished decision, the Special Workers’ Compensation Appeals Panel of the Supreme Court of Tennessee affirmed a decision of a state trial court that found an employee’s workers’ compensation claim was time barred because it had not been filed within one year of the date the employee’s physician, responding to a hypothetical question posed to him by the employee’s attorney, indicated the employee’s condition was work-related [Pearson v. Memphis Light Gas & Water Div., 2021 Tenn. LEXIS 59 (Mar. 24, 2021)]. While the employee did not see the physician’s response until sometime later, the knowledge of his attorney was imputed to him and the statute of limitations, therefore, began to run on the date of the letter, not the subsequent date that the employee saw it.

Background

Pearson was 61 at the time he filed his initial petition for workers’ compensation benefits. He had worked for the employer for 14 years. Pearson drove a bucket truck throughout the city in order to repair and install streetlights. They generally weighed between 25 and 60 pounds each. He testified at trial that he installed approximately 16 lights per day, and that the job required lots of lifting, bending, and twisting of his body.

In March 2014, Pearson saw a physician to address myelopathy that was causing his right leg to drag when he walked. Pearson’s physician determined that Pearson suffered from severe spondylosis at C4-5 with spinal cord compression and hyperintense lesion within the cervical cord itself. The physician recommended a cervical fusion at the affected vertebrae. Pearson successfully underwent surgery on April 9, 2014, and his symptoms subsequently abated.

In early 2016, Pearson began to experience problems that resembled those precipitating his earlier surgery. Pearson’s physician diagnosed Pearson as having a large rupture disc at C3-4. In late July 2016, Pearson again underwent surgery.

On September 8, 2016, responding to a hypothetical question posed to him by Pearson’s attorney, the surgeon indicated that Pearson’s injury was 75 to 80 percent related to his work. The attorney showed Pearson the letter on December 19, 2016, and Pearson provided his employer with notice of the injury two days later on December 21. Pearson then filed his initial petition for benefit determination on October 9, 2017.

On March 16, 2020, the trial court entered an order denying Pearson’s claim for benefits. It held the claim was barred by the one-year statute of limitations in Tenn. Code Ann. § 50-6-203(b)(1) because the date that Pearson discovered his injury was September 8, 2016—the date of Dr. Crosby’s letter. Alternatively, the court held that Mr. Pearson had failed to prove that his injuries were more than fifty percent related to his work for the employer. Pearson appealed.

Special Panel’s Decision

Initially, the Panel noted that Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 50-6-201(b) and 50-6-203(b)(1) provide that for a workers’ compensation claim to be timely, the employee must both give notice to the employer within fifteen days of the injury and file a petition for benefit determination within one year of the same. Similarly, the one-year statute of limitations in subsection 203(b)(1) begins to run when through the exercise of reasonable care and diligence it becomes discoverable and apparent that the employee sustained a compensable injury.

Principal and Agent

Pearson argued that the date of discovery should be when his attorney relayed the information to him instead of the date Pearson’s attorney first received the letter. The Panel indicated, however, that Tennessee case law made clear that Pearson’s attorney’s receipt of the doctor’s letter was treated just as if Pearson himself had received it. The rule had its roots in basic principles of agency law, which impute an agent’s knowledge onto the principal when the agent is acting on the principal’s behalf.

The Panel concluded that because Pearson was deemed to possess the same knowledge that his attorney possesses, Pearson discovered that his myelopathy could be work related in September 2016. By filing his initial petition on October 9, 2017, Pearson did not make a claim for workers’ compensation benefits until more than one year after discovery. Pearson’s claim was barred by the statute of limitations; the judgment of the trial court was affirmed.