When Cancer Meets Causation: Wrestling with Medical Mystery in 1951 In workers’ compensation law, few challenges prove more vexing than establishing causation when the medical community itself admits ignorance about...
Throwback Thursday: Boyd v. Young (1951) Throwback Thursday: Boyd v. Young (1951)In an important decision construing the Iowa doctrine that allows gross negligence and fraudulent misrepresentation tort claims against co-employees, the Iowa Supreme Court has revived claims against Tyson Foods executives...
Iowa High Court Says Gross Negligence/Fraud Claims Can Go Forward Against Tyson Executives Iowa High Court Says Gross Negligence/Fraud Claims Can Go Forward Against Tyson ExecutivesA Horseplay Case That Shaped Utah’s Workers’ Compensation Doctrine In Prows v. Industrial Commission of Utah, 610 P.2d 1362 (Utah 1980), the Supreme Court of Utah was presented with a...
Throwback Thursday: Prows v. Industrial Commission of Utah (1980) Throwback Thursday: Prows v. Industrial Commission of Utah (1980)Exclusivity Does Not Shield Corporate Officers/Property Owners From Liability as Landlords In Nelson v. Smith, 2025 N.C. App. LEXIS 306 (May 21, 2025), the North Carolina Court of Appeals reversed...
When the Boss Wears Two Hats When the Boss Wears Two HatsA New York appellate court held that where a physician testified that a claimant developed neck and shoulder pain “due to repetitive stress and forceful use of the upper extremities...
Indefinite Medical Testimony Sinks NY Claimant’s Occupational Disease Claim Indefinite Medical Testimony Sinks NY Claimant’s Occupational Disease ClaimA New York appellate court affirmed a decision by the state’s Workers’ Compensation Board that a freelance per diem technician was not fired in retaliation for his filing of a...
Injured NY Freelance Technician Loses in Bid to Show Termination of Employment was Retaliatory Injured NY Freelance Technician Loses in Bid to Show Termination of Employment was RetaliatoryA New York appellate court affirmed a decision by the state’s Workers’ Compensation Board that found an injured worker’s failure to disclose work-related injuries he sustained in 1998 and 2002,...
Failure to Disclose Prior Work-Related Injuries Proves Fatal for NY Worker’s Claim for Continued Benefits Failure to Disclose Prior Work-Related Injuries Proves Fatal for NY Worker’s Claim for Continued BenefitsIn a meticulous and well-reasoned opinion weighing and discussing multiple issues, the Supreme Court of Idaho held that the state’s Industrial Commission committed error when it ruled that the claimant’s...
120-Pound Weight Gain Might (or Might Not) Sink Idaho Worker’s Aggravation Claim 120-Pound Weight Gain Might (or Might Not) Sink Idaho Worker’s Aggravation ClaimReiterating that aTexas workers’ compensation carrier is entitled to the “first money” an injured worker recovered in a third-party tort action—here, settlement of a medical malpractice claim—and stressing further that...
Texas Court Stresses Comp Carrier is Entitled to Full “First Money” in Worker’s Third-Party Tort Settlement Texas Court Stresses Comp Carrier is Entitled to Full “First Money” in Worker’s Third-Party Tort SettlementUnder Rhode Island’s so-called Branco exception to the going and coming rule, an employee and/or the employee’s dependents may recover workers’ compensation benefits where the employee’s injury or death results...
RI Supreme Court Broadens “Parking Lot” Rule to Include Leased Properties RI Supreme Court Broadens “Parking Lot” Rule to Include Leased PropertiesN.C. Gen. Stat. § 97-85(a), which empowers the North Carolina Industrial Commission to reconsider the evidence before the deputy commissioner, and to amend the deputy commissioner’s award “if good ground...
NC Court Reiterates that Full Commission, Not the Deputy Commissioner, is the Ultimate Factfinder NC Court Reiterates that Full Commission, Not the Deputy Commissioner, is the Ultimate FactfinderThe Supreme Court of Idaho, construing Idaho Code § 72-438(14)(b), which generally provides firefighters with a rebuttable presumption that certain listed cancers have a causal connection with the employment, held...
To Rebut Idaho’s Cancer Presumption Favoring Firefighters, Employer Must Offer Evidence that Cancer was Not Caused by Employment To Rebut Idaho’s Cancer Presumption Favoring Firefighters, Employer Must Offer Evidence that Cancer was Not Caused by EmploymentWhere a police officer had sustained three prior work-related injuries and sought to receive compensation for an alleged injury to his neck, the burden was on the employee to show...
Lay Testimony Insufficient to Establish Causation for MS Claimant Lay Testimony Insufficient to Establish Causation for MS ClaimantA Florida appellate court held that a judge of compensation claims committed error when he determined that a construction worker who sustained severe injuries in a vehicular accident as he...
Florida Court Stresses There is No “Field Employee” Exception to Statutory Going and Coming Rule Florida Court Stresses There is No “Field Employee” Exception to Statutory Going and Coming RuleA New York appellate court affirmed the state Board’s rescission of a WCLJ’s reduced earnings award where it found that while the workers’ compensation claimant did have medical restrictions following...
NY Court Says Existence of Medical Restrictions Are Alone Insufficient to Establish Reduced Earnings Claim NY Court Says Existence of Medical Restrictions Are Alone Insufficient to Establish Reduced Earnings ClaimIn an important case that may define—at least in California—an employer’s responsibility for injuries sustained when an employee’s family member contracts COVID-19 as a result of an infection that is...
California High Court May Take Another Look at Employer’s Liability for COVID-19 Contracted by Employee’s Family Member California High Court May Take Another Look at Employer’s Liability for COVID-19 Contracted by Employee’s Family Member
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