Court Applies Massachusetts Law to Maine Injury, Rejects Immunity Defense in Multi-State Staffing Arrangement A New Hampshire contractor that likely would have enjoyed workers’ compensation immunity under Maine law lost...
Maine Supreme Court: Massachusetts Law Strips Staffing Client of Workers’ Compensation Immunity Maine Supreme Court: Massachusetts Law Strips Staffing Client of Workers’ Compensation ImmunityNew York’s Court of Appeals recently affirmed an Appellate Division order blocking defendants in a personal injury action from using a Workers’ Compensation Board causation determination as collateral estoppel, holding...
NY High Court Holds JIWA Bars Collateral Estoppel Effect of Pre-Enactment Workers’ Comp Decisions NY High Court Holds JIWA Bars Collateral Estoppel Effect of Pre-Enactment Workers’ Comp DecisionsIn a case involving a Nebraska truck driver-farm laborer whose treatment for metastatic cancer was allegedly postponed by complications associated with a compensable hip injury and its resulting treatment, the...
Nebraska Supreme Court Affirms Denial of Death Benefits Where Work Injury Delayed Cancer Treatment Nebraska Supreme Court Affirms Denial of Death Benefits Where Work Injury Delayed Cancer TreatmentA North Carolina district manager who suffered a stroke while preparing for the opening of a restaurant location—and who allegedly waited hours before coworkers summoned emergency assistance—may not pursue negligence...
NC Court of Appeals: Exclusivity Doctrine Bars Negligence Suit Following Workplace Stroke NC Court of Appeals: Exclusivity Doctrine Bars Negligence Suit Following Workplace StrokeA recent federal district court decision from Oregon, Kwiecinski v. Medi-Tech International Corp., 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 72453 (D. Or., June 3, 2016), provides an important practice point not only...
Cautionary Tale: Retaliatory Discharge Statute May Not Protect Employee if Original Comp Claim Was Filed in Another State Cautionary Tale: Retaliatory Discharge Statute May Not Protect Employee if Original Comp Claim Was Filed in Another StateThe Oklahoma legislature adjourned last Friday (May 27, 2016), without resolving a bill that would have amended several troublesome provisions of the state’s controversial Employee Injury Benefit Act (“opt out”...
Oklahoma Legislature Can’t Agree on Opt Out Fix Oklahoma Legislature Can’t Agree on Opt Out FixPart of SSDI’s Fiscal Weakness Tied to Cost Shifting from Workers’ Compensation In an important recent paper, Professor John Burton and his colleague, Steve Guo, argue that significant fiscal improvements...
Does Long-Term Strength of the SSDI Trust Fund Depend Upon Changes to State Workers’ Comp Programs? Does Long-Term Strength of the SSDI Trust Fund Depend Upon Changes to State Workers’ Comp Programs?The 2013 Oklahoma workers’ compensation “reforms” 2013 Senate Bill 1062 which, among other things, created the state’s uber-controversial “Opt Out” arrangement, in which employers can jettison the entire state-run system...
Oklahoma Supreme Court Lands Yet Another Body Blow to State’s Controversial Opt Out Law Oklahoma Supreme Court Lands Yet Another Body Blow to State’s Controversial Opt Out LawA bill [S. 2506] introduced on February 4, 2016, by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), would, if passed into law, appear to invalidate a core provision found in most Texas workers’...
Leahy Bill in U.S. Senate Could Kill Key Provision in Texas Nonsubscriber ERISA Plans Leahy Bill in U.S. Senate Could Kill Key Provision in Texas Nonsubscriber ERISA PlansOn March 11, 2016, Virginia governor McAuliffe signed into law a bill extending the state’s narrow presumption of compensability [Va. Code Ann. § 65.2–105] to cover most claims where the...
Virginia Legislature Instructs Appellate Court: Deceased Employees Really Are “Physically Unable to Testify” Virginia Legislature Instructs Appellate Court: Deceased Employees Really Are “Physically Unable to Testify”As I reported on Wednesday, in Torres v. Seaboard Foods, LLC, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma struck down a provision in the state’s workers’ compensation law that disqualifies a claimant...
Does Torres Signal How OK High Court Will Decide Constitutionality of Opt Out? Does Torres Signal How OK High Court Will Decide Constitutionality of Opt Out?In Recent “Comp” Decisions (the other from Commission), Oklahoma Legislature Is “0 for 2” A provision in Okla. Stat. tit. 85A, § 2(14) that disqualifies a claimant from recovering for...
Oklahoma High Court Strikes Down State’s 180-Day Cumulative Trauma Employment Rule Oklahoma High Court Strikes Down State’s 180-Day Cumulative Trauma Employment RuleEqual Treatment Under the State’s Dual System is “a Water Mirage” This afternoon (Feb. 26, 2016), in a lengthy Commission Order, the Oklahoma Workers’ Compensation Commission found that Sections 203...
Oklahoma Commission Strikes Down State’s Opt Out Law Oklahoma Commission Strikes Down State’s Opt Out LawAn Indiana jury was within its province as factfinder in returning a verdict for more than $400,000 in compensatory and punitive damages against a former employer in a retaliatory discharge...
Facebook® Plays Role in Indiana $400,000 Verdict for Retaliatory Discharge Facebook® Plays Role in Indiana $400,000 Verdict for Retaliatory DischargeA mother’s wrongful death action against her son’s employer was not barred by the exclusive remedy provisions of the Georgia Workers’ Compensation Act (“Act”) where the undisputed facts clearly showed...
Georgia Mother May Sue Deceased Son’s Employer and Staffing Company Where Co-Worker Murderer May Have been Negligently Hired Georgia Mother May Sue Deceased Son’s Employer and Staffing Company Where Co-Worker Murderer May Have been Negligently HiredWhere a father and son were co-employees working at an excavation site and the son was struck in the head with the bucket of a track hoe—the blow causing serious...
Wyoming Father May Sue Employer For Anguish Related to Co-employee Son’s Death Wyoming Father May Sue Employer For Anguish Related to Co-employee Son’s Death
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